Althouse: What was the carbon footprint?

January 2, 2014

What was the carbon footprint?

"Chinese Helicopter Rescues 52 From Ship Trapped in Antarctic Ice."

23 comments:

AustinRoth said...: Once again, reality does that which no one would believe if it were a book or a movie.; 1/2/14, 12:10 PM
Michael K said...: According to the warmest hysteria brigade, warming is speeding up and is more of a crisis than we knew.; 1/2/14, 12:16 PM
RecChief said...: "The ship had set sail from Bluff, New Zealand, on Dec. 8, embarking on a planned monthlong voyage known as the Australasian Antarctic Expedition to study changes to the environment of East Antarctica since an Australian geologist, Douglas Mawson, surveyed the region a century ago."

So what were they going there to do? The barest hint, in paragrph 14, that they were going there to prove the devastating effects of CAGW.

Beyond the Times' obfuscation by calling everyone on board 'passengers', hahahahahahaha; 1/2/14, 12:19 PM
Mark said...: Ah, summer in Dumont D'Urville; 1/2/14, 12:21 PM
bandmeeting said...: The carbon footprint? They don't care one bit. They have a special dispensation, being True Believers.

It's the rest of us that need to worry about that stuff because we are bad, bad, bad for having stuff.; 1/2/14, 12:22 PM
Bill, Republic of Texas said...: I don't understand the rescue of the scientists but not the crew? If there's no danger why remove people?

If I go camping in the woods, and I decide I don't want to lug my supplies back out, can I get a free helicopter ride home?

What a bunch of pussies.; 1/2/14, 12:22 PM
MadisonMan said...: Wait -- the scientists weren't rescued, were they? I thought just the paying passengers.

I think the crew in this case does include the people -- scientists -- doing the experiments. (But I could be wrong).; 1/2/14, 12:25 PM
Bill, Republic of Texas said...: @MadisonMan

the article said the crew 0f 22 were left behind and 52 passengers removed (with their luggage). the head scientist tweeted they were all safe on the ice breaker and heading towards Tasmania.; 1/2/14, 12:32 PM
Patrick said...: I thought the science was settled. Why the need for "further research?"; 1/2/14, 12:40 PM
Sorun said...: At least one scientist should have stayed behind to measure the ice as it thickens around the ship.; 1/2/14, 12:46 PM
lgv said...: The crew needs to be there when the ship can free itself of the ice. The can run quite some time from a supply standpoint now that the passengers are gone.

As noted by Bandmeeting, they are exempt from the carbon footprint test because they are working for the cause.

As I keep pointing out, carbon footprints are meaningless until we define whether the measurement is relative or absolute. If Gore's mansion uses geothermal, is it OK even though he's generating more carbon the couple in the mobile home using heating oil? If Sergey Brin reduces the number of trips in his yacht, is this better for the planet than the average person who makes no changes?; 1/2/14, 12:48 PM
MadisonMan said...: Bill, yes, I misread that.; 1/2/14, 1:10 PM
Original Mike said...: I think a fair computation of the carbon footprint has to include the construction of a new ship, if the ship stuck in the ice is lost.; 1/2/14, 1:34 PM
n.n said...: "Climate Change" (drop the inconvenient anthropogenic qualifier) aka Credibility Closure; 1/2/14, 1:53 PM
traditionalguy said...: The Helo could only carry 12 at a time. So it made 5+ trips to take them off to a landing site on the flat ice shelf near the open water. Then they were driven down to a barge that drove them to the Australian Icebreaker far enough out at the open sea to avoid being trapped.

But the good news is that all CO2 emitted caused the Atmosphere to warm 0.0000001C.; 1/2/14, 2:04 PM
Jaq said...: They were conducting science in the same way that civil war re-enactors are conducting history. There is some relationship there, but I will be curious to see if even one paper issues from this, or one paper cites their data.; 1/2/14, 2:49 PM
Big Mike said...: They should have been made to wear speedos and bikinis to demonstrate their belief in global warming.; 1/2/14, 4:04 PM
damikesc said...: And, the stories are loathe to discuss why they were there...namely, to demonstrate that global warming is causing the ice caps to melt.; 1/2/14, 5:09 PM
Bob Boyd said...: I'm guessing the scourge of Earth's overpopulation was a topic that didn't come up during that week of waiting for rescue, despite their having plenty of spare time.
Perhaps they missed their chance to make a meaningful impact.; 1/2/14, 5:13 PM
Anonymous said...: Somehow, the news media is not reporting on the tremendous comedic aspects of this whole thing. Ho, Hum, doesn't fit the narrative.....; 1/2/14, 6:56 PM
John Cunningham said...: the ship getting stuck in the ice is a classic instance of the Gore Effect.; 1/2/14, 7:52 PM
Megaera said...: Supposedly these clowns were going to register "strategic changes" from measurements/readings taken by Mawson during his 1914 expedition in the same place. It might fairly have been pointed out before ever they left port that Mawson made actual landfall on an ice-free coast -- so the fact that they couldn't get within a hundred miles of land could be judged by some as a strategic change of a sort right from the get-go ,,, but apparently they didn't see things that way. And yes, the Russian crew stayed on: the ship has not yet had a fatal hull breach (despite an eerie resemblance in some of the photos to Shackleton's Endurance in the degree of lean) and if the winds reverse and the ice moves again before the ship is completely frozen in and crushed, they have a chance of getting it out.; 1/2/14, 10:07 PM
Megaera said...: Supposedly these clowns were going to register "strategic changes" from measurements/readings taken by Mawson during his 1914 expedition in the same place. It might fairly have been pointed out before ever they left port that Mawson made actual landfall on an ice-free coast -- so the fact that they couldn't get within a hundred miles of land could be judged by some as a strategic change of a sort right from the get-go ,,, but apparently they didn't see things that way. And yes, the Russian crew stayed on: the ship has not yet had a fatal hull breach (despite an eerie resemblance in some of the photos to Shackleton's Endurance in the degree of lean) and if the winds reverse and the ice moves again before the ship is completely frozen in and crushed, they have a chance of getting it out.; 1/2/14, 10:08 PM