Volcanoes responsible for sparking Little Ice Age

According to a recent research, the Little Ice Age, more commonly known as LIA, which was a peculiar period of cooling that occurred after the Medieval Warm Period and extended from the 16^th to the 19^th century, might have initiated
through a series of volcanic eruptions sustained by sea ice.

The LIA lasted from 1550 to 1850 and had three particularly cold intervals, one in 1650, another one in 1770 and the last one in 1850. New research that was published today in the journal
Geophysical Research Letters, looked at chemical clues preserved in Arctic vegetation. It also pinpointed the start of the LIA to the end of the 13th century.

During the cold spell, the glaciers destroyed the northern European towns and froze the Thames River as well as all the canals in the Netherlands, places that are now completely ice free.

The climate feedback system explains how this cold period could be sustained for such a long period, states Gifford Miller, a geological scientist at the University of Colorado, Boulder, and lead study researcher.

Aerosols were spewed into the atmosphere due to the massive tropical volcanic eruptions. The solar radiation was reflected back into the space when the aerosols were suspended which cooled the planet. The water that flowed back to the Arctic was even cooler
which helped sustain large areas of sea ice.

The researchers came to these findings by looking at radiocarbon dates, depending on how much radioactive carbon dead plants from Baffin Island contained. The plants were found by melting the ice in the Canadian Arctic. The analysis showed that many plants
died between 1275 and 1300, which means that Baffin Island froze over quite suddenly. A second major cooling occurred in 1450.

The periods coincide with two of the most volcanically active half centuries in the past millennium.

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Posted by Taimoor Tariq on Feb 1 2012. Filed under Sci-Tech. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry