Arctic Council Uses Fairbanks Meeting to Think About The Future. Midway through the U.S. chairmanship of the eight-nation Arctic Council, the group is taking time to look at the long-term future of the world's northernmost region - and itself. David Balton, the State Department official who chairs the Arctic Council's Senior Arctic Officials group, said on Friday that council leaders used this week's meeting in Fairbanks to look beyond the two-year U.S. chairmanship. Alaska Dispatch News

 

US Official Urges Arctic Council Group to Adopt Long-Term Approach to Climate Change. U.S. Ambassador David Balton says on the final day of the Senior Arctic Officials' meeting, he challenged participants to break out of what tends to be a short-term mindset that comes with the two-year chairmanship of the Arctic Council, the organization that represents the interests of the eight circumpolar nations and other groups, such as the region's indigenous peoples. KUAC

 

Scientist: Arctic Warmth Setting Up Conditions for New Low-Ice Record. The forces that brought record-high winter temperatures to the Arctic are creating conditions that are ripe for a new record-low sea ice extent later this year, one Alaska scientist warned on Friday. This year's pattern of low winter sea ice and weather is "quite similar" to the winter pattern that led to what was a record-low sea ice extent in September 2007, said Xiangdong Zhang with the International Arctic Research Center at the University of Alaska Fairbanks. Alaska Dispatch News

 

Geoscientist: Warming Polar Regions Trigger 'Unstoppable' Ice Melting, Sea-Level Rise. Julie Brigham-Grette paraphrases a popular advertising slogan to explain why the rapid warming under way in the Arctic should concern more people than just those who live up here. "The Arctic matters, because what happens in the Arctic doesn't stay in the Arctic," she says. Brigham-Grette says warming in both the Arctic and Antarctic is triggering changes in weather patterns and sea levels worldwide. She heads the Geosciences Department at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, and she and other experts described those climate-change impacts in stark terms in a briefing held during Arctic Science Summit Week at the University of Alaska-Fairbanks. KUAC

 

Seabird Die-Off Takes Twist With Carcasses in Alaska Lake. The latest twist was the discovery of thousands of carcasses of common murres along a freshwater Alaska lake. U.S. Geological Survey research wildlife biologist John Piatt says an estimated 6,000 to 8,000 carcasses were counted last month on the shore of Lake Iliamna in southwest Alaska. Alaska Public Radio

 

Nobel Peace Prize Winners Call for Halt to Arctic Drilling. In a letter, six female Nobel laureates urged Arctic countries to put a stop to drilling in the region. "We urge you to seize this moment, to set a high standard for multilateral climate leadership, to protect the Arctic Ocean from the dangers of fossil fuel extraction, and to lead as the world builds the safe, clean, and renewable energy future we need," the letter reads. Alaska Dispatch News

 

An Expedition of Reconciliation. Getting to experience the outdoors with Students on Ice (SOI) was a transformational experience for me and allowed me to experience and share my culture in new ways. What SOI facilitated was a space in which we, Inuit, were able to share our culture with non-Inuit but were also able to learn from each other. This helped a lot of Inuit, including myself, to come into their own during the expedition overcoming insecurities.We went on hikes in Sisimiut in western Greenland where we were shown the sod houses that Inuit inhabited before its colonization. Colonization is the deliberate process in which a supposedly dominant group attempts to dispossess another group of its land, culture, and identity to then reap the benefits whatever they may be. Throughout the rest of our trek across the circumpolar Arctic colonization was a consistent topic of conversation. As depicted through the imagery of contemporary housing in the background of the sod houses, we learned about the comings and goings of certain cultures and peoples. Whether it was the Vikings at the beginning of the millennia who brought new technologies, the whalers who brought disease, or missionaries that brought religion; Inuit have remained culturally resilient through contact. The Arctic Institute

 

The Alaska's First New Butterfly Species in Decades an Ancient Hybrid? Some might say it takes a rare breed to survive the Alaska wilderness. The discovery of a possible new species of hybrid butterfly from the state's interior is proving that theory correct. Belonging to a group known as the Arctics, the Tanana Arctic, Oeneis tanana, is the first new butterfly species described from the Last Frontier in 28 years and may be its only endemic butterfly. Alaska Native News

 

Navy Submarines Arrive in Arctic for Ice Exercise 2016. Two Los Angeles-class submarines arrived at US Navy Ice Camp Sargo, a temporary station on top of a floating ice sheet in the Arctic on March 14, as part of Ice Exercise (ICEX) 2016. USS Hartford (SSN 768) from Groton, Conn., and USS Hampton (SSN 767) from San Diego will conduct multiple arctic transits, a North Pole surfacing, scientific data collection and other training evolutions during their time in the region. Military.com