Fortunately, the Internet has a memory. Here’s some excerpts from the story by Damian Carrington. After reading it, I can see why they disappeared it.
The planet’s last great global ice melt left a benign and balmy climate in which civilisation was cradled: the new great melting heralds a grave threat to civilisation
Our planet is waving the white flag of surrender. But as the polar flag becomes ever more tattered, with holes scorched by hotter ocean waters, humanity pumps ever more globe-warming gases into the air.
…
In 2007, a new record was set for the minimum summer sea ice cover in the Arctic had halved. This furious flag waving attracted attention. That year, the world’s scientists declared the end of any doubt that our addiction to burning fossil fuels was changing the face of the planet. Al Gore expounded his inconvenient truth and the world seemed set to act.
Today, that 2007 record is smashed and the shredded white flag is now flickering rathering than flashing. But the danger is greater than even, even if the alarm signal is frayed.
…
Decades from now, will today’s record sea ice low be seen as the moment when our Earthly paradise gave up the ghost and entered a hellish new era? I sincerely hope not, but with this global distress signal failing to attract attention, I fear the worst.
You can read the whole article archived here: http://old-news.co.uk/category/guardian/
h/t to Tom Nelson
BTW there’s still ice at the pole, see it in the WUWT sea ice page
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UPDATE: It was offline earlier. I guess now that we showed the cat was out of the bag they decided to put it back online.
– Anthony
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Okay, so the article states:
Huh? This passage is riddled with inaccuracies. First, satellites did not begin to document Arctic sea ice until 1972, not 1968 as claimed. Second, the famous Earthrise image was taken by Apollo 8 astronauts on December 24, 1968, and the Arctic is NOT visible because it was the boreal winter. Third, if the Arctic were visible in the Earthrise image, the sea ice extent would have been much greater than the 8m square kilometers claimed. It probably would have been closer to 13m square kilometers. Finally, there are only two continents visible in the image — Africa and a tiny piece of Antarctica — and neither of them is “verdant” (lush green).
Have I missed something?
Some have observed that no one much reads the Guardian. Unfortunately, the BBC take more copies of the Guardian than any other paper, and recruit virtually exclusively via that paper. ‘Nuff said!
I suppose looking at arctic sea ice alone and drawing conclusions about global warming is cherry picking. Maybe they should mention world sea ice when referring to global warming and arctic sea ice when referring to regional climate change.
Hey, give the guy a break. I’ve got a soft spot for purple prose, and Damian Carrington is darn good at it. He’s probably got a good novel written, but can’t find a publisher. So he had to get a day job.
By the way, has anyone else noticed that sections of the “ice free” parts of the Arctic Sea have some pretty big chips of ice floating about in them? For example, look off the NW coast of Alaska in the “Cryosphere Today” map. It shows no ice. It sure doesn’t show any chips where, “The ice pack measures about 30 miles by 12 miles,” and “In one point, we estimate the thickest part of the ice to be about 25 meters.” (That’s about 80 feet.)”
Ice free?
http://www.adn.com/2012/09/10/2619205/shell-halts-chukchi-sea-drilling.html
He fails to mention the short length of the measurement period in which that 2007 record appears.
Eric Dailey said on September 14, 2012 at 8:07 am:
He’s too busy finishing up his live performance in an improvised play that’s loosely an updated rendition of the Carter presidency. Here at the end, it’s a consulate instead of an embassy and some other actors forgot to take that group hostage, possibly understandable as numerous other actors have already taken and are holding American hostages. But with American savings, jobs, competitiveness, value of currency, and worldwide prestige all heading to or already in the crapper, it sure looks like it’ll stay faithful to the original’s ending.
Strange that the global temperatures from the satellites (like UAH) saw nothing unusual about this year temperature-wise. Neither the Danish Meteorological Institute temperature north of 80N, normal. Could this possibly just be ocean currents at work? Seems more that likely to me, bottom up and not top down. Ocean floor volcanic action may be the other possible explanation. Either way I see no co2 involvement from above or am I missing something?
“…our Earthly paradise…”
Hahaha! I bet he was tempted to use the word “Utopia!” What a bed-wetting idiot.
I clicked the old-news link, got fed up waiting for the rotating thingie to finish and the page to appear, so came back, read the post, and the comments, then followed the revivified Guardian link, read that and ran off a pdf of it, then came back … and the rotating thingie was still rotating on the old-news tab. Ironically, it looks like the old-news link that isn’t working, for me at anyrate. Must be all those WUWT visitors doing their server in.
Daily Mash (UK’s “Onion”) Guardian T-shirt
“The Guardian. Wrong about everything all the time”
http://www.shotdeadinthehead.com/product_view.aspx?pid=1573
A must have…
Perhaps I should send on to poor little Damian. Am still unsure as to whether his sneer in the Guardian’s mug shot of him is worse than little Leo Hickman’s.
Probably the best mechanism to explain how ice ages develop evolves little/no ice in the Arctic Ocean around end of summer and a cooling planet at the same time. Ideal conditions for snowfall in regions that are usually fairly dry and cool in summer, giving increased risk of snow failing to complelely melt the following summer.
I know most on here are sceptical, as am I. But I do find the reduction in arctic sea ice worrying. Maybe this is just a human fear of change. The evidence suggests it really is happening and not some figment of someone’s imagination.
Will it continue? Will that ice retreat and the Antarctic ice expand? What will this change mean for us?
Plenty of questions, I don’t pretend to know the answers.
So many attacks on a piece of journalistic exaggeration.
So little questioning as to why the arctic melt this year has smashed the 2007 minimum – and the melt is continuing.
Its interesting that many sceptics on this thread already appear to be discounting an ice free arctic including
anarchist hate machine
and AW
who said
“BTW there’s still ice at the pole”
That good to know then.
So why the big melt ? Large positive anomalies in sea surface temperature and air temperature.
NASA GISS for August is now published and shows a 0.56 C anomaly globally cf 1951-1980, with most of the arctic showing big anomalies (again) particularly north of Canada and Greenland.
BTW I don’t read the Grauniad.
From James Abbott on September 14, 2012 at 1:26 pm:
Actually, if you were paying attention you would have known from the start it’d be a lousy year for the ice. A lot of thin first-year ice, including that bump-up at the end of the freeze period that was guaranteed to go away quickly.
And the weather patterns have been screwed up lately. The contiguous US had an all-time record high July while the rest of the planet was running cooler. Screwy weather patterns like that lead to interesting storms, as seen in the Arctic.
So with so much thin ice and so little multi-year ice, the Arctic was pre-conditioned for a large loss this year at the start. Add the freak storm that tore up so much ice, which should well have been expected, and this year is not surprising.
BTW, why bother mentioning “…the melt is continuing” anyway? By the IARC-JAXA graph I can see about another week of melt is within historical norms. Besides, looks bottomed-out anyway.
Thanks kadaka
But you are wrong. The ice conditions are a factor, but the melt trend, and this year’s massive melt, is continuing mainly because the arctic is warming.
Your “weather patterns have been screwed up lately” is global warming. The USA has had its hottest recorded year to date and that heat has extended north over Canada and Greenland, accelerating the melt.
And if “you were paying attention” you would have seen that its not just the thin ice that has melted
Look at
http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/
Which says that
Between mid-March and the third week of August, the total amount of multiyear ice within the Arctic Ocean declined by 33%, and the oldest ice, ice older than five years, declined by 51%.
The excuses are running out.
Why am I reminded of the George Carlin routine about those who are so dedicated to saving the planet? He finished by saying: “The PLANET is fine … it’s the PEOPLE who are f—–!”
Even if all the Arctic ice melts, sea level will not rise one single centimeter. Ice floats, and the Arctic ice cap is essentially the world’s largest floating ice cube. Antarctica is gaining ice mass (see previous thread) and the Greenland ice cap will take 1500 years to melt, per Dr. Susan Solomon, U.S. delegate to the IPCC and AGW defender.
So, to the Guardian reporter–why the panic? The PLANET is fine, and if it warms by a few degrees C., we may be on the way to a new higher equilibrium temperature. Big deal! We humans may not like having to abandon cities like New York, Boston, New Orleans, Amsterdam, or Copenhagen, but what ever happens, we are going to have plenty of time to adapt to new realities! “Tipping points” are a Hansen-created and sponsored myth.
From James Abbott on September 14, 2012 at 2:48 pm:
Actually the PDO has flipped and we’re switching over from a La Nina to an El Nino regime, etc, thus we’re in a time of flux consistent with the variation of the natural cycles, with a blocking high over the contiguous US much like the recent Russian heat wave was due to a blocking high,
But why let real meteorological science interfere with your confirmation bias?
The Guardian has a very good free Sudoku page.
I appreciate and apologise for this not being strictly on-topic but what does Prof Viner think of this?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/sep/14/arctic-sea-ice-harsh-winter-europe
Eeek….meant ‘I appreciate that that this isn’t strictly on-topic and apologise’…………..sounds better?
Thanks kadaka
Wrong again. We are not into a full blown El Nino yet – and it may fizzle out anyway. Fact is that the USA has to date seen its hottest recorded year without an El Nino.
And can you explain why you think I have a “confirmation bias”. Why is it that sceptics so often resort to insults when challenged ?
I am happy to state that the antarctic sea ice is not following the arctic trend and that the large positive temperatures anomalies in the far north are not being mirrored (widely) in the far south. I am happy to state these things because thats what the data says.
Can you please say what the natural cycle is that is causing the arctic ice cap to melt – so fast ?
Chris R says
“Even if all the Arctic ice melts, sea level will not rise one single centimeter”
Really ? What do you think will happen to the glaciers in Greenland, Baffin Island and the rest of the arctic if the sea ice goes ? No glacial acceleration due to mechanical change (loss of coastal sea ice) ? No increase in air temperature due to loss of ice refrigeration of surface air ? No feedback effect of albedo change from light to dark surfaces ? No it looks like those glaciers will be just fine in glorious isolation surrounded by warming seas and atmosphere.
James Abbott says:
September 14, 2012 at 4:08 pm
You have been smacked about with knowledge here before and now you are back for more? You have NOT read ANYTHING posted to you and that is made obvious by your odious post here. Did you think no one would notice?
So tired of going over the same old hackneyed arguments from uninformed planet savers. Abbott, take your fingers out of your ears and READ the response to you.
Kadaka did not say we are in a full blown el nino. READ HIS DAMN POST!!! It is like you have NO reading compression.
It looks like Antarctic sea ice will be a record maximum extent for the satellite era. I look forward to hearing how GHGs can simultaneously cause a record minimum Arctic sea ice extent and a record maximum Antarctic sea ice extent.
Compression or comprehension, they both work.
Genuine question from a former full-blown AGW supporter…
That last question about the Antarctic ice cover sparked a question………When we were in the throes of the last ice-age which I understand manifested itself in the northern hemisphere in the main what was the south pole doing?
Don’t put the boot in too hard, I’m not asking a ‘leading’ question….Just interested.