An American scientist says the ice cap at the North Pole has melted.
Dr James McCarthy, an oceanographer, says he found a mile-wide stretch of
open ocean on a recent trip to the pole.
Some experts believe it is the first time in more than 50 million years that
the North Pole has been covered in water rather than ice.
They point to it as further evidence of global warming - but other scientists
say movements in polar ice regularly create gaps in the ice cap - including
at the North Pole itself.
Future explorers may need snorkels not skis
Dr McCarthy told the New York Times newspaper that he found the new patch of
ocean during a trip earlier in August on board a Russian icebreaker.
"It was totally unexpected," he said.
Another scientist on the cruise, palaeontologist Dr Malcolm C McKenna, said
the ship was able to sail all the way to the North Pole through only a thin
crust of ice, and arrived on the spot to discover no ice at all.
"I don't know if anybody in history ever got to 90 degrees north to be
greeted by water, not ice," Dr McKenna was quoted as saying.
"Some folks who pooh-pooh global warming might wake up if shown that even the
pole is beginning to melt at least sometimes."
Ivory gulls
The lecturers say the ice cap in the whole area was so thin that the ship had
to sail for another 10 kilometres (six miles) to find ice thick enough for
the tourists to leave the boat and walk on the ice cap, as they had been
promised.
The party also saw ivory gulls flying overhead, which ornithologists say is a
first for the area.
Dr McCarthy, who is working on studies for the Intergovernmental Panel on
Climate Change (IPCC), says has previously found the North Pole covered in
some 3 metres (9 feet) of ice during the summer.
Shrinking
Despite the lack of agreement over whether the North Pole stretch of water
was as a result of melting or ice movement, scientists do agree that the ice
cap in general is shrinking.
Satellite studies have already suggested that the ice cover in the Arctic has
thinned by more than 40% over the past 50 years.
Some scientists say it could disappear altogether by the end of the 21st
century.
Campaigners want tougher controls on pollution to try to slow down the global
warming which they say is causing the changes.
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