Whales Help Researchers Take Winter Temperature of Greenland’s Coastal Waters
WASHINGTON — Scientists using sensors attached to a type of Arctic whale known for its unicorn-horn-like tooth have detected continued warming of the southern Baffin Bay off West Greenland. The temperatures of the waters have continued to rise since wintertime ocean temperatures were last effectively measured there in the early 2000s, the researchers reported October 23 in the Journal of Geophysical Research – Oceans, a publication of the American Geological Union (AGU).
Temperatures in the study were collected by narwhals, a medium-sized whale species, during missions in 2006 and 2007. The animals were tagged with sensors that recorded ocean depths and temperatures during feeding dives from the surface pack ice to the seafloor, as deep as 1,773 meters, or more than a mile. (more…)