We may be entering an extended period of 'global cooling'

The Sept. 23 issue of TIME MAGAZINE reported there has been, in just the past year, "a 60 percent increase in ice-covered Arctic Ocean waters." Some climate scientists claim that the planet is undergoing "GLOBAL COOLING," what I call a 'naturally occurring climate cycle.'

The Northwest Passage from the Atlantic westward to the Pacific Ocean has remained blocked by pack-ice all year. More than 20 yachts that had previously planned to sail the Passage have been turned back along with a cruise ship attempting the ice-bound route. Almost a million square miles more of the Arctic Ocean was ice-covered than in 2012.

Many eminent climate scientists from around the world believe that the Earth is heading into "an extended period of global cooling that may not end until the middle of this century."

As I've reported frequently in the Coeur d'Alene Press and elsewhere in the past decade or so, widespread global warming "ended 15 years ago in 1998." At least it hit 'the pause button.'

The global warmist's climate models have been "gravely flawed," according to many climate scientists, including yours truly. It was only six years ago that the BBC predicted that "the Arctic would be 'ice-free' by 2013." Well, that didn't happen, needless to say. They were dead wrong!

The UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was due to publish "a landmark report on global warming" in Stockholm, Sweden, on Friday, Sept. 27. More than 800 climate scientists contributed to the report.

According to 'leaks' from the climate scientists working on this report, "greenhouse gas emissions keep rising, but global warming has definitely slowed down."

There is mounting evidence that Arctic ice levels, like all 'natural' climate cycles tied in with the sun, are likewise 'cyclical.' For example, the massive polar ice melt of the 1920s and 1930s was followed by intense re-freezes from the 1940s through the chilly 1970s. Up until 2013, we saw a gradual shrinking of the Arctic Ocean icepack that began in the summer of 1979.

Since the last Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Report in 2007, much has changed, weatherwise and otherwise. There has been no significant warming. In fact, the recent winters in Europe have been the coldest and snowiest seasons in more than 200 years. This recently-expired winter of 2013 in South America was the coldest and snowiest such period in a century in parts of the continent. In mid September, Argentina lost at least 20 percent of its 2013 winter wheat crop to an extremely hard freeze.

A recent study by Climatologist Francis Zwiers and his colleagues at the University of Victoria in British Columbia found that climate models by many global warmists "had overestimated this predicted warming by more than 100 percent in the past two decades."

Our friend, Robert Felix, believes that we are "on the threshold of another 'Little Ice Age,'" or at least a mini-Maunder event like what happened in the 1600s when the Thames River froze solid during the mid winter months in London. There were fairs held on the ice every winter season.

Recently, the canals froze in Venice, Italy. Schools were closed due to heavy snowfalls in Rome for the first time in more than 100 years. Snows likely caused many traffic accidents last winter in North Africa. Snowball fights broke out in Jerusalem last January.

But, as I've said hundreds of times in the past decade, what we're seeing are normal climate cycles that return like 'clockwork.' As my friend Anthony Watts says, "it's the SUN, stupid!"

One last note, I wish to thank Jim Hollingsworth for his kind comments in his 'My Turn' column in the Sept. 24 issue of the Press.

But, I'm not entirely 'self-taught.' I have more than 30 units of college credit in my favorite subjects of meteorology and climatology.

NORTH IDAHO WEATHER REVIEW AND LONG-RANGE OUTLOOKS

I observed our first fall morning early Thursday under 40 degrees with a 39.4 degree reading recorded at 7:12 a.m. on Player Drive. Some areas to the north and east of Coeur d'Alene had lows in the lower 30s with light frosts. The mountains above 4,000 feet reported several inches of snow near the Idaho/Montana border at midweek.

As of this early Thursday writing, Sept. 26, we had gauged a healthy September precipitation total of 1.80 inches. This compares to just a 'trace' of moisture the entire month of September of 2012 and our normal monthly September rainfall of 1.48 inches since 1895 in Coeur d'Alene.

To answer a Press subscriber's question, yes, John, I have noticed that Spokane frequently misses many of the storms that hit us in moist North Idaho. For example, several stations locally, including Fernan Lake and Kellogg, received more than a third of an inch of precipitation on Wednesday, Sept. 25, while the Spokane area was rainless.

Since Jan. 1 of this year, at least dozen storm systems produced moisture in the Coeur d'Alene area, completely missing Spokane, which had, as of early Thursday, only received 8.15 inches of rainfall in 2013 compared to a well-above-normal 18.90 inches in Coeur d'Alene in the same period, more than 10 inches above Spokane's total.

Longer term, both Randy Mann and I are still looking for a wetter and cooler than normal fall and early winter period through the end of the year across the Inland Empire.

As far as the fast-approaching winter of 2013-14 is concerned, we are still anticipating at least 30 percent more snowfall than usual across North Idaho, if the weak 'La Nina' in the eastern Pacific waters doesn't completely fall apart. If it does 'bite the dust,' however, snowfall amounts could drop sharply. Once again, only time will tell. We'll keep you posted.

Cliff Harris is a climatologist who writes a weekly column for The Press. His opinions are his own. Email sfharris@roadrunner.com