South Baffin (Canada) swelters in winter heat wave

Source: Nunatsiaq News

A bag of ice cubes left on New Year’s Eve near an Iqaluit apartment’s front door was melting Jan. 4, as temperatures around South Baffin reached record highs as much as 20 degrees (Celsius) above normal.

Iqaluit set new records with temperatures rising to +1.2 C Jan. 3 breaking the record of —1.7 C set in 1970, said Yvonne Bilan-Wallace, a meteorologist with Environment Canada.

... “The normal around this time of year is around -22C,” she said. “So yeah, you’re way above normal.”

Pangnirtung also set a record high temperature, peaking at +8 C Jan. 4, shattering an old record of —3.7 C set in 2002. Kimmirut hit +1C Jan.4, breaking a previous record high of —5.5C.

Read more: http://www.nunatsiaqonline.ca/stories/article/98789_south_baffin_swelters_in_winter_heat_wave/

+1.2 C = +34.2 F

+8.0 C = +46.4 F

Both are above freezing (obviously)

That's fucking crazy. When they're experiencing close to maximum darkness, to boot.

I'm in Nova Scotia, which is nearly as far south as Canadians can get; when winter's been around long enough that people have acclimatized to the cold/wind, on days where it's a couple degrees above freezing I'll see people not bothering with coats or the like at all, wandering around talking about how nice it is.

(Of course, if it hit that temperature in, say, September, they'd have been used to the summer instead and would be cowering behind a foot of fleece.)

:o

This is just an unusual weather event, but these events are becoming more common.

As CO2 causes the atmosphere to retain heat, the energy of the system increases. One way this increase in energy manifests itself is stronger winds. Winds blow the cold air out of the Arctic into Europe and the east coast of the United States causing severe snow storms. Warm air from the south replaces the cold air delaying the Arctic freeze. This time of year Hudson bay is completely frozen over, but not this year. Vast areas of open water in Hudson Bay are allowing heat from the water to escape into the atmosphere exacerbating the problem.

Strong winds are also the cause of last years severe weather in Pakistan and Russia.

:o