Bewilderment As Russian Winter Shrivels In Face Of Global Warming
Pastor Dale Morgan
Bewilderment As Russian Winter Shrivels In Face Of Global Warming*
by Sebastian Smith
Moscow (AFP) Dec 15, 2006
There is not quite the drama of a Florida hurricane, or the poignancy of
stranded polar bears, but Moscow babushka Larisa Bilik is struggling to
sell her wool socks -- and global warming, experts say, is also to
blame. The warmest November-December since records began has put
Russia's fearsome winter on the back foot.
Mushrooms are sprouting outside Moscow, bears are unable to hibernate,
and Bilik, who looks older than her 53 years, is having trouble
attracting customers to her stall in the city centre, where she hawks
thick socks, slippers and fake fur vests.
"When it's cold, they buy, when it's warm they don't," she says, gold
teeth flashing against the gloomy, almost permanent twilight that has
oppressed sunless -- and snowless -- Moscow for several weeks.
Gennady Yeliseyev, deputy director of the state's weather service, the
Gidrometeocentre, said that since November 20 Russia has experienced the
warmest temperatures since records began in the 1870s.
"Average temperatures for the first 10 days of December are minus five
degrees Celsius (23 degrees Fahrenheit) and the current abnormalities
range as high as plus 10 degrees Celsius (50 Fahrenheit)," he said.
"This is the weather we'd normally have in late October."
Scientists here believe Russia has fallen victim to the phenomenon of
global warming already blamed for turning European ski resorts into
grass meadows, driving exotic fish to British coasts, and whipping up
ever more destructive natural disasters.
"The obvious explanation is that very powerful cyclones are forming over
the north Atlantic and moving toward the Barents Sea," Yeliseyev said.
"But there is also general change to a warmer climate and you cannot
deny a link to the greenhouse effect."
Leading weather expert Alexander Bedritskovo said that climate change in
Russia is "reality."
Although temperatures will inevitably drop -- wet snow could start
falling in Moscow this week, according to forecasters -- weird things
are already happening in a country synonymous with harsh, long winters.
In far away Siberia, the ice has begun to melt and break up along a
155-mile (250-kilometre) stretch of the great river Yenise.
At the Moscow zoo, warm temperatures are prompting birds into the love
making usually reserved for spring, while the brown bear couple Mushir
and Rosa are grumpily insomniac as they wait for snow and hibernation.
"His mood is worse, but she's calmer," zoo spokeswoman Yelena Mendosa
said. "She's a female and she deals with his moodiness because she loves
him."
Human inhabitants of the capital find the lack of snow a mixed blessing.
"Of course I'm waiting impatiently for winter -- I'm a Russian!"
exclaimed economics teacher Nina Babrova, 55, resplendent in one of the
few fur hats visible on Moscow's streets.
But joining the huddle of smokers on the pavement outside Soyuz Bank,
Vladimir Sharikadze, 20, crossed his fingers that the milder weather
would last. "This is great for us smokers. Maybe when winter comes we'll
have to give up."
Yekaterina, a 20-year-old student, was also making the most of the phony
winter.
While most women are now wrapped in trousers and boots, her legs were
clad in nothing but thin tights and a skirt that came well above the
knees. "This is easy," she said.
And will she be that brave when the traditional Russian freeze finally
strikes? She laughed under her white wool hat.
"You must be crazy!"
Source: Agence France-Presse