Giant plumes of methane bubbling to surface of Arctic Ocean

[entropy13]

Dramatic and unprecedented plumes of methane – a greenhouse gas 20 times more potent than carbon dioxide – have been seen bubbling to the surface of the Arctic Ocean by scientists undertaking an extensive survey of the region.

The scale and volume of the methane release has astonished the head of the Russian research team who has been surveying the seabed of the East Siberian Arctic Shelf off northern Russia for nearly 20 years.

In an exclusive interview with The Independent, Igor Semiletov, of the Far Eastern branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, said that he has never before witnessed the scale and force of the methane being released from beneath the Arctic seabed.



Full article here.

 

[JATownes]

And then the Arctic Shelf went "KABOOM"!!!!

 

[HossHuge]

And then the Arctic Shelf went "KABOOM"!!!!

You're not far off JATownes. This could change the way we live in a hurry. Hopefully, they find a way to harness it.

If you don't want to learn about it, the action starts at about the 2:30 mark.

 

[Deleted member 24505]

Burn it i say

 

[(FIH) The Don]

We don't need no water let the motherfucker burn
Burn motherfucker burn

 

[dorsetknob]

age old Question has now been answered

and the question was

Where do whales go to fart

 

[c12038]

Its Pengiun fart not whale fart

 

[entropy13]

Its Pengiun fart not whale fart

There are no penguins in the Arctic, only the Antarctic.

 

[Mr McC]

Santa let one slip when he saw this year's budget for presents?

 

[Iceni]

Interestingly i do remember something about natural methane saturation been able to take the buoyancy out of water and air. Making planes fall out of the sky, and Boats instantly sink. It was one of the Bermuda triangle hypothesises.

I personally wouldn't want to be working near these things. Imagine the health and safety sheet!

Natural methane in air (asphyxiation)
Natural methane in water, you ship will sink
Natural methane in atmosphere in high concentrations you plane will fall out of the sky.

Don't wear nylon!
No smoking!

And it'll be bloody cold to boot!

An explanation for some of the disappearances has focused on the presence of large fields of methane hydrates (a form of natural gas) on the continental shelves.[28] Laboratory experiments carried out in Australia have proven that bubbles can, indeed, sink a scale model ship by decreasing the density of the water;[29] any wreckage consequently rising to the surface would be rapidly dispersed by the Gulf Stream. It has been hypothesized that periodic methane eruptions (sometimes called "mud volcanoes") may produce regions of frothy water that are no longer capable of providing adequate buoyancy for ships. If this were the case, such an area forming around a ship could cause it to sink very rapidly and without warning.

Wiki source (sorry) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bermuda_Triangle

 

[Inceptor]

Well, it's been known for a few years now and it's not good.
Methane is a potent greenhouse gas.

Something similar happened, on a much larger scale, in combination with other things, over a long period of time, during the Permian extinction (The Great Dying) of 250 million years ago.

 

[unsmart]

great, now big oil can rape the arctic waters "to save the earth"

 

[dorsetknob]

This is already happining
article here
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petroleum_exploration_in_the_Arctic

so far the largest area or the arctic to suffer oil exploitation is ALASKA

There are 19 geological basins making up the Arctic region. Some of these basins have experienced oil and gas exploration, most notably the Alaska North Slope where oil was first produced in 1968 from Prudhoe Bay. However, only half the basins - such as the Beaufort Sea and the West Barents Sea - have been explored.

Prudhoe Bay Alaska is adjacent to the largest oil field in the United States.

without ALASKEN OIL the USA would have been BUTT SHAFTED years ago

Mexico(for it has large oil deposits) most probably would have been annexed as a US unincorporated territory (like Puerto Rico )