The following details on NASA 's live webcast and story today (Thursday 23rd) may be of interest: Release is scheduled for around 18:00 hrs Irish time.

NASA satellite observations show there has been considerable warming of the Arctic over the last two decades. Simultaneously, a retreat of Arctic sea-ice cover has been observed. Due to the prominent role Arctic ice cover plays in ocean circulation, atmospheric processes and the global energy balance, such changes in the Arctic can have significant implications for the global climate. (See below for URL's etc)

These are all the details I have to hand in advance of the broadcast. So all I can add at the moment is as follows:

According to Pat Finnegan of GRIAN:

"This is yet another study showing that high latitude warming is moving at a substantially faster rate than lower latitude warming in *both* hemispheres. This confirms predictions made by most of the world's major climate models. Other results already released this year tend to indicate an alarming trend indicating that general warming is now possibly moving at a far faster rate than even the most pesssimistic assumptions previously generated by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)."

Live Webcast: Earth Science Update: Arctic Warming Affects Sea Ice and Global Climate 23 October 2003, 1 p.m. EDT

For more information please visit:

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NASA's Arctic ice (cryospheric) findings and potential implications are the topic of the next Earth Science Update Thursday, Oct. 23, at 1 p.m. EDT in NASA Headquarters' James Webb Auditorium, 300 E Street S.W., Washington.

Live webcast is available at "Watch NASA TV Now!"