Every now and then, I come across something that seems too ridiculous to be true, and I have to do a double take and reread. Today I came across one of those items that I found so positively outlandish that I had to read it repeatedly, and I'm still having a hard time digesting it. From Global Warming: The World's Endangered Destinations:
Northwest Territories, Canada: Polar bears have become one of the more obvious victims of the impact of global warming. With about 23,000 square miles of Arctic sea ice melting every year, the bears' hunting grounds are shrinking rapidly. Some scientists predict polar bears will be extinct in the next century.
What was that, again?
With about 23,000 square miles of Arctic sea ice melting every year...
23000 square miles? Really?
For a sense of perspective, and with the help of Google Maps, I did a quick sanity check on exactly how big that is, and came up with this:
From Denver going south, go to Santa Fe, New Mexico.
From Denver, going east, drive to Kansas City, Missouri.
Stop.
That's how much Arctic ice will melt this year.
That's insane. How can that not be an imminent threat? How far above sea level are Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Manhattan, again? How about Tokyo? Or London?
1 Comment:
That's around the size of West Virginia melting off each year. Yep, we're going out with the polar bears.
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