NASA AND NOAA ANNOUNCE ANTARCTIC OZONE HOLE IS A RECORD BREAKER

[mikegeukes]

[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]NASA AND NOAA ANNOUNCE ANTARCTIC OZONE HOLE IS A RECORD BREAKER[/FONT]​

http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2006/s2725.htm

Mike

 

[David Draun]

Damn, and just a few years ago, they said it was getting smaller.

 

[Mike Smith]

The difficulty in predicting the ozone hole and very long range weather/climate is discussed in this thread:

http://stormtrack.org/forum/showthread.php?t=9830

 

[Aaron Kennedy]

From my understanding, the polar vortex was stronger than normal this year which led to colder temps-> more stratospheric clouds-> more ozone destruction. Looking at the graph we're already below the maximum value obtained for the day between 1996 and 2005, so don't go blowing away ozone theory quite yet.

http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/stratosphere/sbuv2to/gif_files/ozone_hole_plot.png

"

From www.theozonehole.com
Is the ozone hole recovering ? Some reports in the media suggest that the ozone layer over Antarctica is now recovering. This message is a little confused. Recent measurements at surface monitoring stations show that the loading of ozone destroying chemicals at the surface has been dropping since about 1994 and is now about 6% down on that peak. The stratosphere lags behind the surface by several years and the loading of ozone depleting chemicals in the ozone layer is at or near the peak. Satellite measurements show that the rate of decline in ozone amount in the upper stratosphere is slowing, however the total ozone amount is still declining. The small size of the 2002 ozone hole was nothing to do with any reduction in ozone depleting chemicals and it will be a decade or more before we can unambiguously say that the ozone hole is recovering. This assumes that the decline in ozone depleting chemicals continues and that there are no other perturbations to the ozone layer, such as might be caused by a massive volcanic eruption or Tunguska like event. It will be the middle of this century or beyond before the ozone hole ceases to appear over Antarctica. What we saw in 2002 is just one extreme in the natural range of variation in the polar stratosphere and is the equivalent of an extreme in 'stratospheric weather'. By contrast the 'weather' in 2003 moved to the opposite extreme and we saw one of the largest ozone holes on record."


I think that sums it up pretty well....