Polar Climate Changes Viewed As Menacing

May 29, 1947

At a seminar of the Geophysical Institute of the University of California today, professor Hans W. Ahlmann of the Swedish Geographical Institute, Stockholm warned that profound temperature changes are affecting the North Polar region, and possibly the world. Dr. Ahlmann bases his conclusions on expeditions to the region starting in 1919. Since 1900, water temperatures have risen 3-5 degrees Fahrenheit, and air temperatures are as much as ten degrees higher. This has triggered the melting of glaciers and the incremental rise of the nearby seas.

Ahlmann warned the group of scientists, â€œIf the Antarctic ice regions and the major Greenland ice cap should be reduced to the same rate as the present melting, oceanic surfaces would rise to catastrophic proportions. Peoples living in lowlands along the shore would be inundated.â€ He urged his colleagues to discover the reasons for these mysterious changes, which are, he believes, already affecting the weather in Eastern Africa.