![\"Gulf](\"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/Gulf_Stream.jpg\")
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And just like that we’re free from climate hysteria and worried about a new “ice age”…Funny how that works, isn’t it?\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n A new study in\u00a0Communications Earth & Environment<\/em>\u00a0warns that a key Atlantic current could near collapse within decades, potentially triggering an \u201cice age\u201d scenario and major sea-level rise,\u00a0according to the NY Post<\/a>.<\/p>\n The research, from the Chinese Academy of Sciences\u2019 Institute of Oceanology and UC San Diego, focuses on the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC), the \u201cconveyor belt of the ocean\u201d that includes the Gulf Stream and helps keep Europe, the U.K., and the U.S. East Coast relatively mild.<\/p>\n The\u00a0Post writes<\/a>\u00a0that the study argues that warming temperatures are melting the Greenland ice sheet, sending freshwater into the North Atlantic and slowing the AMOC. Researchers say they\u2019ve detected a related \u201cdistinctive temperature fingerprint\u201d several thousand feet below the surface.<\/p>\n \u201cHere we identify a distinctive temperature fingerprint in the equatorial Atlantic that signals the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation change,\u201d they wrote, adding that its \u201crobust physical mechanism and reliable detection make [this fingerprint] a valuable metric for AMOC monitoring in a warming climate.\u201d<\/p>\n Using the MITgcm climate model and ocean data back to 1960, the team concludes the AMOC has been weakening since the late 20th century and could collapse before 2100. If that happened, Europe could face drastic cooling \u2014 possibly nearly 60 degrees \u2014 and drier conditions. As Jonathan Bamber told the\u00a0Daily Mail<\/em>, \u201cWinters would be more typical of Arctic Canada and precipitation would decrease, also.\u201d<\/p>\n Reuters notes the AMOC last collapsed before the Ice Age ended roughly 12,000 years ago.<\/p>\n