Post by Avenger on Jan 27, 2014 9:51:25 GMT -5
Just because you had to be up at 0500,... sheesh. 
Great Lakes have most ice in decades thanks to bitter winter
1/27 - This winter's frigid temperatures have produced the largest amount of ice cover on the Great Lakes in at least 25 years. Nearly 60 percent of the lakes are now under a cover of ice, according to the Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory in Ann Arbor, Mich.
The ice cover could help lake levels this summer, but that is far from certain. And biologists are keeping a close eye on northern Lake Superior in the hope that an ice bridge will link Ontario to Isle Royale.
The island is the home to a struggling gray wolf population in desperate need of new genetic stock — and more wolves.
One possible effect of so much ice this winter is that come summer the "lake effect" in cities such as Milwaukee, Chicago and Duluth, Minn., could be even cooler.
The ice cover this winter is a stark contrast to last winter, when the five lakes had only 38 percent cover, according to the research laboratory, which tracks ice conditions on the lakes. The long-term average of the lakes is about 50 percent, according to George Leshkevich, a scientist with the laboratory, which is part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Of all of the lakes, Lake Michigan has the smallest amount of ice — about 38 percent. But Lake Erie is almost entirely covered. Leshkevich says Erie often gets the most ice because it is the shallowest of the Great Lakes.
To the north, 57 percent of Lake Superior is covered with ice. As the deepest of the Great Lakes, Leshkevich said, Lake Superior takes more sustained cold air to freeze, and because it produces considerable wave action from prevailing westerly winds, ice is slower to form.
With record low water levels on Lake Michigan and Lake Erie, the massive amount of ice could have a beneficial effect by slowing evaporation from the lake, but other factors could limit the effect.
Last February, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers reported that Lake Michigan and Lake Erie hit their lowest recorded levels. Last summer, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported on 14 years of below-average water levels on the lakes.
But the relationship between ice cover, evaporation and water levels is complex. Researcher Jay Austin of the University of Minnesota-Duluth says the ice "acts like a giant piece of plastic" over the lake. That means water can't evaporate as readily from sunlight.
Austin says this season's cold weather in late fall and early winter, combined with the relatively warmer water, created conditions that are "tremendously evaporative."
"Lake smoke" in cities such as Milwaukee and Duluth can often be seen rising from the lake. That's evaporation, Austin says. "So to get to all of this ice, there had to be a lot of evaporation in the first place," Austin said.
In his research, Austin has found that in years of extensive ice cover, lakes take much longer to warm the next summer. That could mean cooler lakeside temperatures this spring and summer.
Satellite maps show northern Lake Superior socked in with ice. On Isle Royale, as late as Thursday, wolf researcher Rolf Peterson of Michigan Tech said by email that he could still see gaps in the ice and it was premature to say a bridge had formed.
Biologists hope that will happen — the last time was 2008. If ice from Ontario stretches to the island, it could mean the introduction of new wolves, which could help boost the population and diversify the gene pool.
The last time a wolf migrated across the ice was 1997. The wolf population on the island dropped from 16 in 2011 to eight in 2013. In their first 2014 post from the island on Jan. 12, researchers from Michigan Tech tracking the wolf and moose population on the island wrote:
"If climate projections are accurate, only one or two more ice bridges are likely before the lake is expected to be perpetually free of any significant ice formation (by 2040.)
"Ice bridges are important because they represent the possibility that a wolf can migrate from Canada and infuse the population with new genetic material — this appears vital for the population's vitality."
Lookback #71 – Tug Allegheny sank at Traverse City on January 27, 1978
1/27 - A wild winter blizzard and a build up of ice on the superstructure resulted in the tug Allegheny capsizing at the dock in Traverse City, Mich., 36 years ago today.
Originally a deep-sea tug, the vessel was built at Orange, Texas, for the United States Navy in 1944. It was known as ATA-179 until 1948.
The ship came to the Great Lakes in 1969 and was operated as a training vessel by the Great Lakes Maritime Academy of Traverse City. It was owned by them when the storm of January 27, 1988, sent the tug to the bottom.
Allegheny was sold to Malcolm Marine, salvaged and towed to Port Huron for a refit. The ship resumed service that year as Tug Malcolm and used in a variety of towing projects.
Following a resale to Florida based interests, Tug Malcolm passed down the Welland Canal on July 5, 1998. It was turned over to a new crew at Montreal and renamed Matthew Beyel later that year. In 2005, became Alejandro for American Tugs Inc.
Skip Gillham
Today in Great Lakes History - January 27
In 1912, the Great Lakes Engineering Works' Ecorse yard launched the steel bulk freighter WILLIAM P. SNYDER JR (Hull #83), for the Shenango Furnace Co.
LEON FALK JR. closed the 1974 season at Superior by loading 17,542 tons of ore bound for Detroit.
January 27, 1985 - CITY OF MIDLAND 41 had to return to port (Ludington) after heavy seas caused a 30-ton crane to fall off a truck on her car deck.
On 27 January 1978, ALLEGHENY, the training vessel of the Great Lakes Maritime Academy (built in 1944, at Orange, Texas as a sea-going naval tug) capsized at her winter dock at Traverse City, Michigan, from the weight of accumulated ice. She was recovered but required an expensive rebuild, was sold and renamed MALCOLM in 1979.
On 27 January 1893, Charles Lonsby and Louis Wolf purchased the 161- foot wooden steam barge THOMAS D. STIMSON for $28,000. The vessel was built in 1881, by W. J. Daley & Sons at Mt. Clemens, Michigan, as a schooner and was originally named VIRGINIUS. She was converted to a steamship in 1887.
1972: The Canadian coastal freighter VOYAGEUR D. hit a shoal off Pointe au Pic, Quebec, and was holed. It was able to make the wharf at St. Irenee but sank at the dock. The cargo of aluminum ingots was removed before the wreck was blow up with explosives on November 8, 1972.
1978: A major winter storm caught the American tanker SATURN on Lake Michigan and the ship was reported to be unable to make any headway in 20-foot waves. It left the Seaway for Caribbean service in 2003 and was renamed b) CENTENARIO TRADER at Sorel on the way south.
2002: SJARD first came through the Seaway in 2000. It was lost in a raging snowstorm 350 miles east of St. John's Newfoundland with a cargo of oil pipes while inbound from Kalinigrad, Russia. The crew of 14 took to the lifeboat and were picked up by the BEIRAMAR TRES.
2006: PINTAIL received extensive damage in a collision off Callao, Peru, with the TWIN STAR. The latter broke in two and sank. PINTAIL began Seaway service in 1996 and had been a regular Great Lakes trader as a) PUNICA beginning in 1983. The ship arrived at Chittagong, Bangladesh, for scrapping as c) ANATHASIOS G. CALLITSIS and was beached on September 19. 2012. It had also traded inland under the final name in 2008 and 2009.
Great Lakes have most ice in decades thanks to bitter winter
1/27 - This winter's frigid temperatures have produced the largest amount of ice cover on the Great Lakes in at least 25 years. Nearly 60 percent of the lakes are now under a cover of ice, according to the Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory in Ann Arbor, Mich.
The ice cover could help lake levels this summer, but that is far from certain. And biologists are keeping a close eye on northern Lake Superior in the hope that an ice bridge will link Ontario to Isle Royale.
The island is the home to a struggling gray wolf population in desperate need of new genetic stock — and more wolves.
One possible effect of so much ice this winter is that come summer the "lake effect" in cities such as Milwaukee, Chicago and Duluth, Minn., could be even cooler.
The ice cover this winter is a stark contrast to last winter, when the five lakes had only 38 percent cover, according to the research laboratory, which tracks ice conditions on the lakes. The long-term average of the lakes is about 50 percent, according to George Leshkevich, a scientist with the laboratory, which is part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Of all of the lakes, Lake Michigan has the smallest amount of ice — about 38 percent. But Lake Erie is almost entirely covered. Leshkevich says Erie often gets the most ice because it is the shallowest of the Great Lakes.
To the north, 57 percent of Lake Superior is covered with ice. As the deepest of the Great Lakes, Leshkevich said, Lake Superior takes more sustained cold air to freeze, and because it produces considerable wave action from prevailing westerly winds, ice is slower to form.
With record low water levels on Lake Michigan and Lake Erie, the massive amount of ice could have a beneficial effect by slowing evaporation from the lake, but other factors could limit the effect.
Last February, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers reported that Lake Michigan and Lake Erie hit their lowest recorded levels. Last summer, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported on 14 years of below-average water levels on the lakes.
But the relationship between ice cover, evaporation and water levels is complex. Researcher Jay Austin of the University of Minnesota-Duluth says the ice "acts like a giant piece of plastic" over the lake. That means water can't evaporate as readily from sunlight.
Austin says this season's cold weather in late fall and early winter, combined with the relatively warmer water, created conditions that are "tremendously evaporative."
"Lake smoke" in cities such as Milwaukee and Duluth can often be seen rising from the lake. That's evaporation, Austin says. "So to get to all of this ice, there had to be a lot of evaporation in the first place," Austin said.
In his research, Austin has found that in years of extensive ice cover, lakes take much longer to warm the next summer. That could mean cooler lakeside temperatures this spring and summer.
Satellite maps show northern Lake Superior socked in with ice. On Isle Royale, as late as Thursday, wolf researcher Rolf Peterson of Michigan Tech said by email that he could still see gaps in the ice and it was premature to say a bridge had formed.
Biologists hope that will happen — the last time was 2008. If ice from Ontario stretches to the island, it could mean the introduction of new wolves, which could help boost the population and diversify the gene pool.
The last time a wolf migrated across the ice was 1997. The wolf population on the island dropped from 16 in 2011 to eight in 2013. In their first 2014 post from the island on Jan. 12, researchers from Michigan Tech tracking the wolf and moose population on the island wrote:
"If climate projections are accurate, only one or two more ice bridges are likely before the lake is expected to be perpetually free of any significant ice formation (by 2040.)
"Ice bridges are important because they represent the possibility that a wolf can migrate from Canada and infuse the population with new genetic material — this appears vital for the population's vitality."
Lookback #71 – Tug Allegheny sank at Traverse City on January 27, 1978
1/27 - A wild winter blizzard and a build up of ice on the superstructure resulted in the tug Allegheny capsizing at the dock in Traverse City, Mich., 36 years ago today.
Originally a deep-sea tug, the vessel was built at Orange, Texas, for the United States Navy in 1944. It was known as ATA-179 until 1948.
The ship came to the Great Lakes in 1969 and was operated as a training vessel by the Great Lakes Maritime Academy of Traverse City. It was owned by them when the storm of January 27, 1988, sent the tug to the bottom.
Allegheny was sold to Malcolm Marine, salvaged and towed to Port Huron for a refit. The ship resumed service that year as Tug Malcolm and used in a variety of towing projects.
Following a resale to Florida based interests, Tug Malcolm passed down the Welland Canal on July 5, 1998. It was turned over to a new crew at Montreal and renamed Matthew Beyel later that year. In 2005, became Alejandro for American Tugs Inc.
Skip Gillham
Today in Great Lakes History - January 27
In 1912, the Great Lakes Engineering Works' Ecorse yard launched the steel bulk freighter WILLIAM P. SNYDER JR (Hull #83), for the Shenango Furnace Co.
LEON FALK JR. closed the 1974 season at Superior by loading 17,542 tons of ore bound for Detroit.
January 27, 1985 - CITY OF MIDLAND 41 had to return to port (Ludington) after heavy seas caused a 30-ton crane to fall off a truck on her car deck.
On 27 January 1978, ALLEGHENY, the training vessel of the Great Lakes Maritime Academy (built in 1944, at Orange, Texas as a sea-going naval tug) capsized at her winter dock at Traverse City, Michigan, from the weight of accumulated ice. She was recovered but required an expensive rebuild, was sold and renamed MALCOLM in 1979.
On 27 January 1893, Charles Lonsby and Louis Wolf purchased the 161- foot wooden steam barge THOMAS D. STIMSON for $28,000. The vessel was built in 1881, by W. J. Daley & Sons at Mt. Clemens, Michigan, as a schooner and was originally named VIRGINIUS. She was converted to a steamship in 1887.
1972: The Canadian coastal freighter VOYAGEUR D. hit a shoal off Pointe au Pic, Quebec, and was holed. It was able to make the wharf at St. Irenee but sank at the dock. The cargo of aluminum ingots was removed before the wreck was blow up with explosives on November 8, 1972.
1978: A major winter storm caught the American tanker SATURN on Lake Michigan and the ship was reported to be unable to make any headway in 20-foot waves. It left the Seaway for Caribbean service in 2003 and was renamed b) CENTENARIO TRADER at Sorel on the way south.
2002: SJARD first came through the Seaway in 2000. It was lost in a raging snowstorm 350 miles east of St. John's Newfoundland with a cargo of oil pipes while inbound from Kalinigrad, Russia. The crew of 14 took to the lifeboat and were picked up by the BEIRAMAR TRES.
2006: PINTAIL received extensive damage in a collision off Callao, Peru, with the TWIN STAR. The latter broke in two and sank. PINTAIL began Seaway service in 1996 and had been a regular Great Lakes trader as a) PUNICA beginning in 1983. The ship arrived at Chittagong, Bangladesh, for scrapping as c) ANATHASIOS G. CALLITSIS and was beached on September 19. 2012. It had also traded inland under the final name in 2008 and 2009.
