Scientists: Ozone Hole Bigger Than Ever

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The New York Sun

WASHINGTON — This year’s Antarctic ozone hole is the biggest ever, government scientists said yesterday.

The so-called hole is a region where severe depletion of the layer of ozone — a form of oxygen — has been observed in the upper atmosphere that protects life on Earth by blocking the sun’s ultraviolet rays. Scientists say human-produced gases such as bromine and chlorine damage the layer, causing the hole. That’s why many compounds such as spray-can propellants have been banned in recent years.

“From September 21 to 30, the average area of the ozone hole was the largest ever observed, at 10.6 million square miles,” an atmospheric scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md., Paul Newman, said. That’s larger than the area of North America.In addition, satellite measurements observed a low reading of 85 Dobson units of ozone on October 8. That’s down from a thickness of 300 Dobson units in July.


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