Ozone hole is smaller than last year.The ozone hole ozone hole n. An area of the ozone layer, such as the large area over Antarctica or the smaller area over the North Pole, that periodically becomes depleted of ozone. over Antarctica this year fell short of 1998's record size, providing a piece of good news about the atmosphere's ability to recuperate re·cu·per·ate v. To return to health or strength; recover. from an overdose of pollutants. "Before the patient can recover, it has to stop getting sicker. The hole doesn't seem to be getting bigger. This is the first indication that we have of what we expect," says David J David J. Haskins (b. April 24, 1957, in Northampton, England) is a British alternative rock musician. He was the bassist for the seminal gothic rock band Bauhaus. Life and work . Hofmann of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Noun 1. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration - an agency in the Department of Commerce that maps the oceans and conserves their living resources; predicts changes to the earth's environment; provides weather reports and forecasts floods and hurricanes and in Boulder, Colo. The ozone hole develops in the stratosphere over Antarctica in the Southern Hemisphere's springtime, when sunlight returns to the polar region. The light catalyzes chemical reactions involving chlorine and bromine bromine (brō`mēn, –mĭn) [Gr.,=stench], volatile, liquid chemical element; symbol Br; at. no. 35; at. wt. 79.904; m.p. –7.2°C;; b.p. 58.78°C;; sp. gr. of liquid 3.12 at 20°C;; density of vapor 7. pollutants that destroy ozone. Satellite measurements reveal that the ozone hole was slightly smaller this year, covering an area of 25.0 million square kilometers on Sept. 15, compared with last year's record size of 27.2 million sq km, says Richard D. McPeters of NASA's Goddard Space Hight hight adj. Archaic Named or called. [Middle English, past participle of highten, hihten, to call, be called, from hehte, hight, past tense of hoten Center in Greenbelt, Md. (SN: 10/17/98, p.246). Satellite- and balloon-borne instruments showed that the amount of ozone over Antarctica bottomed out in early October at a value of 90 to 92 Dobson units, the same as last year. Researchers have recently documented that the amount of ozone-destroying compounds in the atmosphere has stopped rising, thanks to international limits on these chemicals (SN: 3/9/96, p.151). It will take a decade or more, however, before the ozone hole actually starts to shrink by a significant amount, says Hofmann. The difference between 1999 and 1998 resulted from year-to-year fluctuations in Antarctic weather, he says. |
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