Hall Beach (May 16/05) - Nunavummiut are noticing changes to their sunsets and sunrises, and at least one elder thinks the earth may have been knocked off its axis.

"Our earth seems tilted to the left," said Peter Awa from Hall Beach, translated by Richard Amarualik.

He describes how the sun rises further to the right than it used to, away from Hall Beach and towards Repulse Bay. Combine this with shifts in winds from the north to the northeast and he expects drastic changes in the future.

He wonders if the earth will eventually flip right over, or if he's beginning to witness the end of the world described in the Bible.

"I've just talked about what people have noticed. Other people from other communities have said the same thing," he said.

Wayne Davidson, the Resolute weather station operator, wants to know if sunsets look any different around Nunavut than they did a few decades ago.

"What he's describing is warmer air in his region," said Davidson about Awa's comment.

In his 20 years in the High Arctic, Davidson's stared at the sky with fascination. Several months ago, he suggested that reports of brighter dark seasons in communities like Grise Fiord could be the result of what scientists call thermal inversion, which in turn could be linked to global warming.

The phenomena is caused by the combination of layers of warm air in the atmosphere and a very cold band resting over the earth.

The cold air refracts, or bends, light more, causing sunlight to be seen well after the sun has dipped below the horizon. Brighter winters is one of its effects.

Earth warming

If the earth is warming because of greenhouse gases, this could be why sunsets around the North appear to be changing.

Another effect of thermal inversions is that the sun could appear to rise and set in unfamiliar positions.

Davidson wants to gather sun information, from Hall Beach and other communities. He has several questions he hopes Nunavummiut will help him answer.

"What's the shape of the sun when it touches the ground?" is one. In Resolute, he's watched the sun flatten and become square as it sets, or in one dramatic example he caught on film, even take a form resembling an inuksuk.

The flattening sometimes takes the form of what's called a Lintel sun. "You put two stones beneath it, and that's Stonehenge right there," he said.

Another question is "Does it give a brief flash of light?"

Most important, he wants to know if areas accustomed to seeing a squished sunset now witness a typical round sun sink beneath the horizon. That could mean warm air has reached the earth's surface, eliminating thermal inversions completely. This could lead to far darker winters in the future.

"Resolute is the last bastion of cold and it's disappearing, fast," he said.