Looks like Wynne Parry at LiveScience might have the same habit I do – maybe she looks in rather frequently on the mesmerizing day by day oscillations in the slope of a graph one finds at the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder. Such federal outfits as the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and NASA pay for it while the University of Colorado runs it. This year’s been weird. In late April the extent (not the volume, but the area) of Arctic ice reached a high for recent years – all the way up to the average for the years 1979-2000. I seem to recall a few bloggers of doubtful minds noting that the sea ice had recovered. The NSIDC site itself says nothing much can be read into its extent in winter and spring. It’s late summer that matters. It still does not matter much. But anyway – the area just took a jag. It plummeted to well below the same-time point of 2007 that went on, consensus says, to display the least late-summer ice ever seen by recorded mankind. A few say last year reached the same or an even lesser low. And, fact is, 2011 and 2010 were just as low as it is now, at the same time for them, but those years didn’t keep their lead in lowness under 2007.
Hmm. Parry, on second search, isn’t the only one with this story.
Ergo..
- LiveScience – Wynne Parry: Will Arctic Sea Ice Reach Record Low This Year? ;
- Mother Jones – Julia Whitty: Arctic Sea Ice Dips Below Ominous Milestone ;
Both stories are well-buffered with caveats. It is too early to be writing about records. And even if the record is broken, one suspects the iron will of climate change contrarians will only stiffen. That is their nature, it seems. But it’ll merit some coverage either way. After all, the rest of the populace is presumably open to influence by established physical fact.
Grist for the Mill:
- Alfred Wegener Institute for Marine and Polar Research Press Release: North-East Passage soon free from ice again?
– Charlie Petit
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