Nares Ice Bridge Breakup

The ice bridge in Nares Strait at the Kane Basin outlet to Baffin Bay has begun to break up.

There was a plug of consolidated ice solidly wedged across the channel.  Consolidated ice is very strong in compression, but weak in tension, as I have noted in other articles, such as Bridges That Build Themselves.  From that article:

Relic Finds Reveal Zulu War Cover-Up


Paleontologists searching for fossils in a remote area of South Africa were astonished to find spent bullets and cartridge case remnants in an area not previously known as a battle site.  A chemical analysis of the cases and traces of propellant identified the items as being from the time of Britain's wars with the Zulus and the Boers.  Investigators seeking further information about the previously unrecorded presence of British soldiers in the area have found papers in British Government archives which show that a third battle was fought after Isandlwana and

An Arctic Decade 2001 - 2011


For thousands of years the Arctic has been covered in perennial ice with seasonal changes at the margins and some natural variation, seen as losses and recoveries of extent.

For hundreds of years observers have noted that seasonal and local variations at the margins can leave some relatively small regions ice free one year, and solidly iced up in other years.

RMS Titanic - Lessons From History

Titanic 100 Festival

Belfast's most famous creation, Titanic, will be commemorated in an extended annual festival from 31 March - 31 May 2011, which will include key dates of the ship's build.
http://www.belfastcity.gov.uk/titanic/

It is unlikely that anybody involved in the design, construction and operation of RMS Titanic ever claimed that she was unsinkable.  But the rumor persists that the claim was made.

Arctic Ice March 2011 Update #2


The melt season of 2010 ended with a low extent and with little ice older than two years. There are strong indications that the winter of 2010 - 2011 did not compact and thicken the sea ice as much as would normally be expected.

Arctic sea ice extent averaged over December 2010 was 12.00 million square kilometers (4.63 million square miles). This is the lowest December ice extent recorded in satellite observations from 1979 to 2010, 270,000 square kilometers (104,000 square miles) below the previous record low of 12.27 million square kilometers (4.74 million square miles) set in 2006 and 1.35 million square kilometers (521,000 square miles) below the 1979 to 2000 average.
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