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A new study by University of Miami (UM) Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science researchers found that the Indian Ocean's Agulhas Current is getting wider rather than strengthening. The findings, which have important implications for global climate change, suggest that intensifying winds in the region may be increasing the turbulence of the current, rather than increasing its flow rate.
Using measurements collected during three scientific cruises to the Agulhas Current, the Indian Ocean's version of the Gulf Stream, researchers estimated the long-term transport of the current leveraging 22 years of satellite data. They found the Agulhas Current has broadened, not strengthened, since the early 1990s, due to more turbulence from increased eddying and meandering.
One of the strongest currents in the world, the Agulhas Current flows along the east coast of South Africa, transporting warm, salty water away from the tropics toward the poles. The Agulhas, which is hundreds of kilometers long and over 2,000-meters deep, transports large amounts of ocean heat and is considered to have an influence not only on the regional climate of Africa, but on global climate as part of the ocean's global overturning circulation.
There's no knowing if the trend will affect the monsoon.
(Score: 1, Troll) by BK on Friday November 11 2016, @04:58PM
There's no knowing if it will affect Trumps hair either. Of it it will reverse the orbit of the moon. Point?
...but you HAVE heard of me.
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 11 2016, @06:27PM
It is hard not believe you are being disingenuous as a passive-aggressive expression of your beliefs about climate science.
That's because its such well-established, straightforward science that ocean currents affect weather patterns that not even the most hardcore deniers question that simple fact.
(Score: 2) by BK on Friday November 11 2016, @07:33PM
I've posted my "beliefs" about climate science before on SN and you are way off base. I even logged in and used my name. Odd that you describe this as a thing of "belief" though.
There's no knowing whether a "person" posting as AC isn't actually raping a child while posting.
...but you HAVE heard of me.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 11 2016, @07:58PM
> I've posted my "beliefs" about climate science before on SN and you are way off base.
Whatevers, I don't follow you so I have no idea what your beliefs are. Like I said it has hard not to believe otherwise because the question was so fucking stupid.
(Score: 1, Offtopic) by Runaway1956 on Friday November 11 2016, @07:59PM
Maybe you need to be reminded that three years of observations do not establish that there is (or is not) a trend.
Now matter your position on global warming, no matter where you (probably misplaced) faith is, so very many people forget all about what "science" is. FFS, three years of observations of an individual human being may or may not establish some trends. Maybe you'd like to climb inside of some people's minds, and meet the REAL people?
The ocean is vast, and we still don't understand it. But everytime some young "scientist" discovers something new, he wants to write a paper complete with a new law that states mankind has destroyed the world.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by frojack on Friday November 11 2016, @06:43PM
There's also no knowing if the widening is due to simply being more shallow. Warmer water rises, and satellites can't see more than a few inches deep and can't measure anything but surface temps.
A slight temperature change could bring warmer water to the surface, but because the flow rate is the same, this warm water has nowhere go other than to spreads out. This says the effects are likely to be local rather than global.
The article more or less confirms this:
"Increased eddying and meandering could act to decrease poleward heat transport, while increasing coastal upwelling and the exchange of pollutants and larvae across the current from the coast to the open ocean."
So warm water rises, and stays at the top of the water column absorbing more sunlight and heat, evaporating, and brewing more storms. Maybe a new Sargasso sea? But probably good(-ish) news for the Antarctic ice cap, as increased flow would only hasten its demise.
So you are spot on. The Ocean is getting a comb-over.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by fritsd on Friday November 11 2016, @07:22PM
I think that the point was, that most of the people in India depend on the monsoon for their agriculture cycles and, well, to not overheat in summer. So any changes in the monsoon means you have to change when you sow and when you harvest.
I could be totally wrong about that, though; I'm not an expert on Indian agriculture. One news item I remember from this year is that the asphalt was melting somewhere in India (51°C), and they were waiting for the monsoon to come and bring water and cool things down and allow their crops to begin growing.
The monsoon is a periodic phenomenon. This Agulhas current is a periodic phenomenon. It depends on how strongly these two cycles are coupled (if at all). Since the monsoon blows from the sea, and this current is under that sea, it's not unthinkable that there's a coupling.
(Score: 2) by BK on Friday November 11 2016, @07:38PM
There's no knowing what his point was! </sarcasm>
His implication was so broad that he could have been referring to what you said or any number of other things. 'No Knowing' is a discussion killer - unless you mock it.
...but you HAVE heard of me.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 11 2016, @08:01PM
> No Knowing' is a discussion killer - unless you mock it.
Yeah, because that really added to the discussion.
So you aren't a denier, just an uptight nitpicker.
That's why we come to soylent, for the high quality discussion!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 11 2016, @11:49PM
> No Knowing' is a discussion killer - unless you mock it.
Yeah, because that really added to the discussion.
So you are saying you don't know if not knowing is not a good thing? We have just found the square root of ignorance! Oh, great.