Volcanic winters (a cracked pot)

[Beorn Snow]

The Year Without a Summer (also known as the Poverty Year, The Summer that Never Was, Year There Was No Summer, and Eighteen Hundred and Froze to Death) was 1816, in which severe summer climate abnormalities caused average global temperatures to decrease by 0.4–0.7 °C (0.7–1.3 °F), resulting in major food shortages across the northern hemisphere It is believed that the anomaly was caused by a combination of a volcanic winter event, the latter caused by a succession of major volcanic eruptions capped by the 1815 eruption of mount Tambora.

This is just one example of what supervolcanoes can pull off.

This is a sort of a cracked pot, but could it be that there are:

A: many more volcanoes (and more powerful volcanoes) in the world of asoiaf than on earth.

B: these volcanoes occasionally erupt in a cataclysmic way.

Tyrion recalls that it was written that on the day of Doom every hill for 500 miles had split asunder to fill the air with ash and smoke and fire, blazes so hot and hungry that even dragons in the sky were engulfed and consumed. Great rents had opened in the earth, swallowing palaces, temples, entire towns. Lakes boiled or turned to acid, mountains burst, fiery fountains spewed molten rock a thousand feet into the air, red clouds rained down dragongalss and the black blood of demons, and to the north the ground splintered and collapsed and fell in on itself and an angry sea came rushing in.

C: leading to exceptionally long winters.

D: on a planet with a generally very nice climate. (In the north you have summer snows which seems to indicate you have some mild winters inside of the long summers... not just scorching heat.

Ergo: Fire leads to Ice.

[kissdbyfire]

I think the volcanoes/volcanic activity will play an important part somehow. Can't really get into it right now but I'll be back.

And there's Hardhome too, the fires burned so bright the black brothers thought the sun was rising in the north. :uhoh:

[Starfell]

I think if volcanoes were erupting often enough, and powerfully enough to cause Winters lasting from months to years every few years since the Long Night, Planetos would probably look a bit like Venus by now.

The Summer snows in the North are probably the planet's "normal" climate superimposed on top of the magically driven super-seasons

[Beorn Snow]

I think if volcanoes were erupting often enough, and powerfully enough to cause Winters lasting from months to years every few years since the Long Night, Planetos would probably look a bit like Venus by now.

Yes, I agree, this would realistically be the way it´d look. But maybe not fantastically (though Grrm at least tends to go for realistic rather than fantastic).

The Summer snows in the North are probably the planet's "normal" climate superimposed on top of the magically driven super-seasons

I think so probably... But the volcano idea just popped up and I thought I might try for a discussion.

At least I´m pretty sure the Doom was volcanic. Hopefully there is an eruption somewhere before the end.

[Uncle Gery]

So, the Doom shifted planets axis and ending seasonal change. The winters are caused by periodical volcanic activity spewing ash into the atmosphere and thus cooling the climate of entire planet.

Yes, this is it.

[WeirwoodTreeHugger]

I don't know if cataclysmic eruptions are more common, but that doesn't mean it can't be part of the plot. There are a couple possibly volcanic areas besides Valyria and Hardhome. First is Dragonstone. The underground floors are naturally hot. There is lots of obsidian which is made in volcanoes. Second is Winterfell. There are hotsprings everywhere like the areas around the Yellowstone volcano.

[Beorn Snow]

Second is Winterfell. There are hotsprings everywhere like the areas around the Yellowstone volcano.

I´d be slightly amused if WF caldera erupted.

It hasn´t erupted through the entire Stark rule it seems.... Fits the "supervolcano" pattern.

[WeirwoodTreeHugger]

Maybe Greywater Watch seems to move because there are sulfuric gases oozing up from the ground and weary travelers get really high. The Crannogmen are immune because they are part COTF and therefore magical. :cool4:

[Theli]

Maybe the Valyria Doom was a series of volcanic erruptions and there will be a second series of erruptions that will cover the whole continent and have Essos obliterated and that will translate into a very cold winter for the rest of the planet!!! :eek: