SAGINAW BAY University of Michigan biogeochemist Casey Godwin raises a football-size chunk of crystal-clear Great Lakes ice toward the sky and studies it like a miner inspecting a precious gemstone just pulled from the earth.
Godwin's team snowmobiled 5 miles from the shore of Lake Huron's Sagina
Winter Grab: U-M team bores through Saginaw Bay ice to glimpse Great Lakes life below miragenews.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from miragenews.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Nearly all scientific sampling of the Great Lakes is done between May and October, when the lakes are free of ice and the water is warmer.
But this month, scientists from more than a dozen U.S. and Canadian institutions will brave the elements to sample all five Great Lakes and Lake St. Clair in
As temperatures climb, ice coverage is diminishing overall, at a rate of about 5% per decade. The depths of Lake Michigan are warming, and its winter season is shortening. Lake Superior is among the most rapidly warming lakes on earth.