The Ice Age Starts in Potsdam – Record December Snow Cover

Oh the irony!

Potsdam is the home of the alarmist Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, headed by Professor Hans-Joachim Schellnhuber and Stefan Rahmstorf, who has been very busy lately trying to convince the rest of the world that the cold is due to the warming, at least that’s what his models are saying (now).

Snowiest December ever

Potsdam is now well on its way to recording its snowiest December since records began in 1893. The Meteorological Station Potsdam Telegrafenberg has been recording a wide variety of weather parameters since 1893, and looking at the records, no December compares to the one they are having now.

Daily snow cover in Potsdam: Source: http://saekular.pik-potsdam.de/2007_en/index.html

As Rahmstorf and Schellnhuber watch crews remove snow every day at the PIK, they really must be cursing all the white stuff that was never supposed to happen.

Some December data at the PIK – records smashed

On December 21 the station had a snow cover of 33 cm, a December record, smashing the old record of 23 cm set 97 years ago in 1913.

This December will have had snow cover 30 of 31 days (No thaw is in sight) – the 2nd most, just behind 1969 (see Figure below), which saw 31 days of snow on the ground. Currently there is 23 cm of snow cover, which was the old record.

Number of days with snow cover in December. Source; http://saekular.pik-potsdam.de/2007_en/index.html

The average so far for this December has been about 16 cm of snow cover. With the current forecast, that too will not change. If anything it may increase. That will make it an all-time record.

It’s been one of the coldest Decembers in Potsdam since records started. Temperatures for this December in Potsdam have averaged near -4°C so far.

The snow has not only been frequent in Potsdam, but all over Germany. Many cities are poised to set new records for most days with snow cover on the ground. Read here.

21 responses to “The Ice Age Starts in Potsdam – Record December Snow Cover”

  1. Mr Lyn James Jenkins

    Dear Mr Gosselin,
    I hope you had an enjoyable Christmas in the snow of Potsdam. I am 63 years of age , and apart from possibly 1962 , this is the coldest Christmas weather I can remember here , on the West coast of Wales, influenced by the Gulf Stream.
    We have a coastal farm park tourist attraction called Cardigan Island Coastal Farm Park , in Gwbert, Cardigan, Wales , where people come to see Atlantic Grey Seals [robben] and Bottlenose Dolphins in the wild in Cardigan Bay.
    See http://www.cardiganisland.com. Cardigan Island is 200 metres from our coastal farm. We are on the mainland opposite the island.
    I saw your link on the excellent http://www.iceagenow.com . You have a great blog.
    This “global warming” pseudo-science is absolute rubbish.
    What do you think of your thousands of German wind turbines? Have they closed any fossil fuel power stations ? What about “ice-throw” from the blades , as the wind picks up and a thaw sets in after severe weather?
    Have a happy, prosperous 2011 !!

    1. DirkH

      Hi Lyn,

      not one power station in Germany has been closed as a result of the renewables.

      Usually the distances of wind turbines to the next settlement are at least half a km; in some cases protests by locals force even greater distances. So ice-throw accidents are not known to me. The ice shouldn’t be able to travel more than 150m or so, i think.

      Our biggest power source for electricity is BTW domestically produced lignite or brown coal – so we have some leeway when we need to conform to future EU-imposed CO2 reductions; just replace a little lignite by cheap gas.
      (Forgetting for the moment that the EU is largely German-controlled anyway…)

  2. itsfaircomment

    Wot no copyright thingy ? Or are you going with WUWT et al, and just letting everyone copy and republish with a link. This would be a welcome change of heart. 🙂

    1. DirkH

      Pierre’s request was fair: If you copy & paste, copy only excerpts, at most 30% of the story, and provide a link to the original.

      I know several (American) blogs that copy entire articles regularly and give a link to the source. But as Pierre has pointed out, and i agree with his opinion, this is something they should be asking permission for, as they take away traffic from the original creator. Some creators might be fine with that; Pierre is not, and it is his right.

    2. Bernd Felsche

      Please refer to the Berne Convention (described in another thread). Under that Convention, works are protected by Copyright as soon as they are created. It doesn’t require an explicit declaration of Copyright to maintain those rights.

      Signatories to the Convention (countries) agree to implement laws to that effect; but details will vary. The safe assumption when reading stuff online is that works are protected by Copyright; unless there’s an explicit statement to the contrary.

      The exception is “works” by or on behalf of public authorities, departments, etc.. Consult local legislation as to whether there’s any Copyright at all, Copyright owned by “the people” or some variation thereof.

      I rather hestiate to suggest that Pierre is looking to other bloggers to “play nice” and not get lazy in producing content. There’s no need to resort to legal machinations to pull the vast majority of bloggers into line. And the recalcitrant ones are more likely to be engaged by large publishing empires with batallions of lawyers that’d quickly exhaust the meagre resources of a hobbyist.

  3. itsfaircomment

    The whole purpose of getting the information out to the public is to underline the scale of the scam that is ‘global warming/ climate change.carbon tax’. Blogs are a conduit for information, and if the articles are good and attributed correctly, then be happy the information is getting out there. If you are indeed worried about copyright then don’t not use a blog with its RSS and blog feeds etc. There are mainstream bloggers (http://order-order.com/ ) who regularly have work nicked wholesale by the MSM, but take it in their stride as part of what goes on.

    1. itsfaircomment

      error correction: ‘don’t use a blog’

  4. R. de Haan

    Christmas Day is the coldest ever with mercury plummeting to MINUS 18 as UK heads towards the biggest December freeze since 1890

    Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1341484/Christmas-Day-set-coldest-temperature-hits-12-snow-coming.html#ixzz19ESJWOSv
    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1341484/Christmas-Day-set-coldest-temperature-hits-12-snow-coming.html#ixzz197WY7mpX

    Cold snap in Ireland killing cows, sheep, pigs and salmon.

  5. Casper

    Mr. Rahmstorf claims that this harsh winter results from AGW…
    http://www.wissenslogs.de/wblogs/blog/klimalounge/klimadaten/2010-12-19/globale-temperatur-2010
    [quote]Die globale Rekordwärme mag denjenigen wundern, der (wie ich) gerade im Schneetreiben bei minus 10 Grad mit den Kindern Schlittenfahren war. Aber es gibt eben nach wie vor Wetterlagen, die polare Kaltluft zu uns bringen – dafür gibt es in Grönland gerade Plus-Temperaturen. Modellrechnungen sprechen sogar dafür, dass solche Wetterlagen durch den Eisschwund in der Barentssee begünstigt werden und daher infolge der Klimaerwärmung häufiger auftreten könnten. [/quote]
    In contradiction to this Mr. Motif has claimed before that our children won’t know what the snow looks like:
    http://tinyurl.com/3y4delv
    [quote]
    11. Januar 2003
    ABENDBLATT: Erleben wir einen Jahrhundertwinter?
    MOJIB LATIF: Nein. Solche Winter waren früher, vor 50 Jahren, an der Tagesordnung. Heute ist so ein extremer Winter noch alle zehn Jahre mal drin. Eines stimmt aber schon: Es ist in diesen Tagen mancherorts rekordverdächtig kalt.
    ABENDBLATT: Wie geht es weiter mit dem Wetter?
    LATIF: Die Wahrscheinlichkeit, dass so ein Winter sich wiederholt, wird mit Fortschreiten der globalen Erwärmung geringer. Nach 2050 wird in Norddeutschland vermutlich kaum noch Schnee fallen. Auch im Harz nicht. Weiße Weihnachten gibt es in Deutschland dann nur noch in den Alpen von 1500 Meter an. So sieht es jedenfalls im schlimmsten Fall aus, wenn wir nichts tun, um den Ausstoß von Kohlendioxid und anderen Gasen zu reduzieren.[/quote]
    We are having 2010 now. This is third harsh winter in a row…

    1. DirkH
      1. Casper

        A reader at WUWT wrote:

        The weather last summer was hot
        And so it’s Global Warming we got
        Now the winter is cold
        And the experts, we’re told,
        Say that weather is climate…NOT!

        Cute!

  6. R. de Haan

    Must read
    Similarity to 2010/11 winter despite the flip from strong El Nino to strong La Nina by Joseph D’Aleo
    http://icecap.us/index.php/go/joes-blog

  7. R. de Haan

    Drudge Report

    ICE AGE: Columbia, SC has first Christmas snow since records first kept in 1887…
    http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D9KBLRDG0&show_article=1

    Atlanta’s First Since 1882…
    http://www.breitbart.tv/atlantas-first-white-christmas-since-1862/

    Britain considers laws to fine airports for poor service…

    Moscow’s main airport closed after overnight snow…
    http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSLDE6BP01E20101226

    Airport Christmas for Europe’s stranded travellers…

    NYT: Bundle Up, It’s Global Warming…
    http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/26/opinion/26cohen.html?_r=2&ref=opinion

    Paper: ‘No matter what the weather, it’s all due to warming’…
    http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article/557597/201012221907/The-Abiding-Faith-Of-Warm-ongers.htm

    1. DirkH

      “Britain considers laws to fine airports for poor service…”

      This might be related to an according outburst of Siim Kallas, estnian EU transport commissioner and ex member of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union.
      Probably he got stranded on an airport in Brussels on his way home and reacted like a Bolshevik is used to react.
      http://www.ftd.de/unternehmen/handel-dienstleister/:schneechaos-eu-fordert-von-flughaefen-besseren-winterdienst/50208072.html

  8. Casper

    Arctic cold is coming! A new cold record?
    http://www.wetter24.de/de/home/wetter/wetter-news/news/ch/ef8faf35e10001b547444909a6b8758b/article/rekord_kaelte.html

    Strenger Frost ab Dienstag im Nordosten
    Dennoch müssen wir uns warm anziehen. Denn wie man in Abb. 2 sieht, befinden wir uns nach Osten hin am Rande des Tiefs unter dem Einfluss sehr kalter Luft in der Höhe, und diese wird sich auch am Boden bemerkbar machen. In Richtung Mecklenburg-Vorpommern und Brandenburg etwa wird man am Dienstag schon hier und da Orte haben, in denen die Temperatur nicht über die -10°C hinaus kommt.
    Kälterekorde?
    Damit sind erneut Rekorde in Gefahr. Dies belegt ein Blick in die Werte der Wetterstation Berlin-Dahlem, deren Aufzeichnungen bis in das Jahr 1908 zurückreicht. Die bisherigen Tagesrekorde für die tiefste Temperatur betragen:

    * 28.12. -16,0°C (1908)
    * 29.12. -16,4°C (1996)
    * 30.12. -15,6°C (1908)

    Dabei besteht besonders für die Nacht zum 30.12. die Chancen, dass diese bestenfalls deutlich unterboten werden können.

  9. R. de Haan
  10. Casper

    Bornholm snowed in! Just click on video to see the snow cover.
    http://www.tvn24.pl/-1,1687588,0,1,baltycka-wyspa-zatopiona–w-sniegu,wiadomosc.html

  11. DirkH

    Meanwhile, the US is warming relentlessly:

    http://climateaudit.org/2010/12/26/nasa-giss-adjusting-the-adjustments/

    (According to Hansen and Menne.)

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