Gulf Stream Slowed Ten Percent in Little Ice Age OSLO The Gulf
Stream carrying warm water to the North Atlantic slowed about 10
percent in the Little Ice Age from 1200 to 1850, said a U.S.
study published on Wednesday that may give clues to the effects
of modern global warming. The report suggested natural shifts in
the current might have affected climate in past centuries. The
Gulf Stream carries waters from the Gulf of Mexico and boosts
temperatures in northern Europe by between 5 and 10 degrees
Celsius (9 and 18 degrees Fahrenheit) compared with similar
latitudes in Siberia. Driven by winds and the earth's rotation
and pushing heat towards the poles, the warmth it carries is
equivalent to 2,000 times the electricity generating capacity of
the United States. "The strength of the Gulf Stream was about 10
percent weaker during the Little Ice Age," David Lund, of the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology/Woods Hole Oceanographic
Institution, told Reuters. He and two colleagues studied
sediment cores off Florid