Giant ozone hole over Antarctica-How big it grew in 2021 (vid) | Skai.gr

The huge increase of the ozone hole in 2021 over Antarctica, shows a video published by Nasa

The cold winter in the southern hemisphere and the possible effects of global warming have caused the hole to grow to the 13th largest area ever reached since 1979.

The ozone depletion you see in the video was recorded by three satellites operated by NASA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA): Aura, Suomi-NPP and NOAA-20.

Substantial Antarctic Ozone Hole in 2021

(Credit: NASA’s Earth Observatory) pic.twitter.com/QwIgcpBRYr

— World and Science (@WorldAndScience) October 31, 2021

NASA released the new video of the “opening” of the Antarctic ozone hole on October 29. It is expected that this year the hole will not close earlier than the end of November.

Ozone is a natural oxygen compound that forms high in the Earth’s upper atmosphere. The natural type of stratospheric ozone is formed when ultraviolet radiation from the sun interacts with molecular oxygen in our atmosphere. The resulting ozone acts a bit like sunscreen, protecting the Earth’s surface from ultraviolet radiation.

Unfortunately, chlorine and bromine produced by human activities erode ozone as the sun rises over Antarctica after polar winters, as sunlight triggers erosion in this area. The 1987 Montreal Protocol restricts ozone-depleting substances among the nearly 50 states that participate in it, but the majority of the world’s nations have not signed it.

However, NASA said the protocol was useful. “This is a big ozone hole because of the colder-than-average stratospheric conditions of 2021 and without the Montreal Protocol, it would be much bigger,” said Paul Newman, chief earth scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. . .

This year’s ozone hole has reached a maximum size of about the size of North America, or 24.8 million square kilometers. The annual ozone depletion began again in mid-October, NASA said. If the Montreal Protocol had not entered into force, and assuming the amounts of atmospheric matter in the early 2000s, the hole would have been about 1.5 million square miles (about four million square kilometers) larger, the agency.

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