Atmosphere Journal Entry
Gulf of Alaska Is Getting Warmer (December 6, 2002)
False-color satellite picture shows warming of waters (in red and orange) in the Gulf of Alaska. Image courtesy Jesse Allen, NASA's Earth Observatory.
Sea surface temperatures in the Gulf of Alaska are more than 4 to 7 degrees Fahrenheit (2 to 4 degrees Celsius) higher than the average for this time of year, according to data gathered by NASA's Terra satellite. Areas where ocean water is much warmer than the twenty-year average appear in red and orange in the image to the right.
Scientists say the warming is due to an unusual stability between different layers of ocean water this year. Warmer, upper layers of the ocean normally mix with cooler, deeper layers this time of year in the northeastern Pacific and the Gulf of Alaska. But this year, the layers have mixed very little.
The warming could have a big effect on both weather and marine life. More rainfall could fall over British Columbia and the Pacific Northwest. Without the rich supply of nutrients that normally rises to the ocean surface with cooler water, the amount of microscopic plants called phytoplankton could drop. This in turn would have an effect on everything else in the marine food chain, from invertebrates such as shrimp to seals and other marine mammals.
