There is basically no water populating the ITCZ, either.
March 21, 20181930.44z
UNISYS Water Vapor Satellite of the North and West Hemisphere (click here for 12 hour loop - thank you)
The winds currently in Boston are between 22-27 mph and that is not with wind gusts. The wind is out of the north-northeast.
The penetration of the Arctic Vortex is fairly clear where it exists over the USA. This is the fourth such storm to hit the east coast of the USA in three weeks. That is brutal for the people exposed to the chronic cold due to high winds.
In the top picture, the center of the mid-latitude vortex causing all the extreme weather is over southern Ohio. It can be seen in the temperature map of Ohio below and right. See the circulating vortex?
Athens, Ohio is under the center of the vortex. The wind there is 3 to 11 mph out of the northwest. Consequently, due to lower wind speeds at the center, the temperatures are higher and in the 36 to 61 degrees Fahrenheit range.
Yes, while Boston is suffering in the 20s, the temperature in Athens, Ohio will increase as the center circulation is small and brings in warmer air from the west.
Yes, this is a heating planet and it is very odd in its manifestation to the public, but, it is real and it is dangerous.
Why is it cold? Because icefields normally rock solid are melting and giving off their "coldness" to the air rather than remaining with the water/ice.
Everyone knows when they are thirsty on a hot summer day the first thing they reach for is a cold drink, sometimes with ice in the drink to keep it cold. People also know as they sip the drink the ice melts. Sometimes it is not a big deal if the drink is slightly diluted with water, but, sometimes it is. At any rate, the ice does not stay ice when exposed to heat. The ice GIVES OFF COLDNESS and that is transferred, in this case, to the drink. In the case of Greenland, the COLDNESS is transferred to the air where it mixes with warmer air causing high winds and instability in the air masses; hence; a severely dangerous storm.
Climate Change Indicators: Sea Surface Temperatures (click here)
Woods Hole, Massachusetts ocean temperature is 37.8 degrees Fahrenheit (click here). That temperature is above freezing and it will melt ice that touches the water. Albeit slowly, but, it will melt. The problem causing the climate crisis is that the ocean waters are warm and the cold temperatures are never cold enough to maintain ice structures of Earth. In different words, Earth is unable to compensate for the heat due to high levels of greenhouse gases. The other complication of such high density greenhouse gases is ocean acidification. That is happening as well.
14 March 2018
Excessive rates of carbon dioxide (click here) affect the health of key micro-organisms in the oceans, potentially undermining the base of critical marine food chains, according to new research by US scientists....
...Phytoplankton are not only a key food source for global fisheries, they are also important to the removal of CO2, much like how trees absorb the greenhouse gas from the atmosphere.
In a paper published on Thursday in Nature, the team demonstrated how the microscopic plants require carbonate ions to acquire iron from the water to grow....
The above research has been conducted since 2004. It is consistent and duplicated year after year. The plankton are vital to Earth's oxygen and to the food web for fisheries. These are solid facts based in solid science by some of the best minds in the world. It is true.
June 7, 2004
...Robert Frouin, (click here) a research meteorologist with the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, California, said understanding the process by which phytoplankton obtains ocean nutrients is important to understanding the link between the ocean and global climate....
The above research has been conducted since 2004. It is consistent and duplicated year after year. The plankton are vital to Earth's oxygen and to the food web for fisheries. These are solid facts based in solid science by some of the best minds in the world. It is true.
June 7, 2004
...Robert Frouin, (click here) a research meteorologist with the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, California, said understanding the process by which phytoplankton obtains ocean nutrients is important to understanding the link between the ocean and global climate....
As CO2 levels rise, the oceans have less carbonate, affecting phytoplankton's ability to secure sufficient nutrient iron for growth. In fact, the concentration of sea surface carbonate ions are on course to drop by half by the end of this century....
November 6, 2017...Included in the new paper (click here) are some of the most detailed data yet on the depths of the canyons and fjords scarring the Greenland coast, which carry water in from the sea to lap against the ice. The results suggest that the western and northern regions of Greenland are most exposed to the influence of ocean water. Out of 139 ocean-touching glaciers the team identified, they also found that 67 rest in waters 200 meters (about 650 feet) or more below sea level, where warm water is typically found—at least twice as many as previously thought.
And, worryingly, the research suggests that as these glaciers melt and retreat backward, the shape of the seabed will continue to expose many of them to warm ocean water for hundreds of miles as the ice moves inland....
