Will someone tell the Arctic it is supposed to be melting now?

With temperatures in the Arctic remaining cool, it looks as though the ice is continuing to recover from its 2007 lows.

This one will get up Trufflehunter's nose and his repeated claims of "faster melt than ever", but so be it: the latest snow and ice official data shows Arctic sea ice extent for much of April and May has actually exceeded the average, contrary to what alarmists like the Hot Topic bloggers have been braying.

The dark red line measures the actual ice extent against the average (black), whilst the light pink line reflects where faulty sensors had been underestimating Arctic sea ice extent until the fault was discovered. The purple line is 2007 and the blue is 2008.

Meanwhile, this comment on the WattsUpWithThat blog appears to nail stakes through the cold little hearts of the alarmists:

Steven Goddard (17:53:23) :

There isn’t any indication that the ice is “breaking up” in an unusual fashion.
http://nsidc.org/data/seaice_index/images/daily_images/N_daily_extent.png

Temperatures in the Arctic have been running below normal.
http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/meant80n.uk.php

Hudson Bay is still almost completely frozen over. I’m sure the Polar Bears are just fine. A shipper would have to be a complete idiot to try to get through the ice, which is ranging from 1.5 metres to 5 metres thick.
http://imb.crrel.usace.army.mil/newdata.htm

Comments

[robk]

...and still the ice water continues to melt freeze!

[Sam Vilain]

Of course if you go to an actual authoritative source, you'll see the real bad news: that the 2009 sea ice extent is just as bad this year as it was this time in 2007, and still well below the 20-year average.

The first two of the links you post are the usual misinterpretation of data. Reading information from insignificant blips etc.

[Sam Vilain]

Investigating further, here we see a typical practice of a conspiracy theorist such as Mr. Wishart - ironically, one that he was just blasting Hot Topic author Gareth Renowden for - not mentioning the context. The original post was just talking about differences in results between two authoritative sources and adjustments to data from one of their data sets.

Instead we see a selection of data to choose the information which supports the conspiracy theorist's case. This selection of information which does not fit the argument being made is fundamental to their delusion. With the larger context the point being made falls flat on its face.

In any case, the data still supports the trend of the NSIDC data set - that the sea ice extent shrank rapidly in May. This, despite a very slight lower than average temperature is a bit of a worry.

[peter]

Thank you Sam, it is good that you know all the tricks!

Thankfully, the vast majority of sciences are not expecting some god to tidy up the Earth - they are taking a proactive stance.

And still the ice melts.

[robk]

Gosh yes, you're right. Arctic ice IS melting (again)! Wouldn't mind a bit of their heat as we languish in record cold temperatures for May :-D

[Shunda Barunda]

"This, despite a very slight lower than average temperature is a bit of a worry."

No it isn't, if record cold temperatures are not evidence against global warming, then rapid ice melt is not evidence for it.

[AcidComments]

"No it isn't, if record cold temperatures are not evidence against global warming, then rapid ice melt is not evidence for it."

Yeah.

Of interest.

Although it's supposed to be the Northern Summer. Still record cold temperatures are being experienced in parts of N.America and Europe!

Canada frosts the most widespread in recent memory.

WINNIPEG, Manitoba (Reuters) - The multiple frosts that have blanketed Western Canada in the last week are the most widespread in the top canola-growing province of Saskatchewan in at least five years, the Canola Council of Canada said on Tuesday.

http://www.reuters.com/article/environmentNews/idUSTRE55851U20090609

Alberta, Saskatchewan get snow in June

The high for Regina Saturday was 11 C and 8 C on Sunday — well below the seasonal high of 22 C.

http://www.theprovince.com/Technology/Alberta+Saskatchewan+snow+June/1670900/story.html

Headed for a “year without a summer?”

http://www.iceagenow.com/Headed_for_a_year_without_a_summer.htm

[peter]

Acid Comments

Don't fall into the trap of ignoring the longer term trend.

Global warming is a reality. Only mankind can address it.

[Ian]

Ah Peter, you crack me up. You say:

"Global warming is a reality. Only mankind can address it."

Excellent. Best scientific studies to date suggest that if Kyoto had been followed to the letter by every country on earth, including the ones that didn't sign it, temperatures would drop 0.07C by 2050.

Now that we have that fact established, what's plan B?

[AcidComments]

"Excellent. Best scientific studies to date suggest that if Kyoto had been followed to the letter by every country on earth, including the ones that didn't sign it, temperatures would drop 0.07C by 2050."

Yep and some AGW alarmists only estimate a drop of 0.05C!

So after billions $$$ have been scammed in CO2 taxes. It's still a pointless excercise.

Mankind isn't responsible for 90% Climate Change. It's more of a natural cycle than anything else.

"Now that we have that fact established, what's plan B?"

Plan B is to exterminate a good percentage of the surplus human population. That's on the agenda of the Global elite and the High Greenie Priests of Gaia. Since Human's are considered 'parasites, 'useless eaters' and 'dross' on the Planet!

A world's human population of around only 1 to 2 Billion people or less is muted.

Also what's Plan C when that does'nt work?

[peter]

Yes guys - I suppose you god will provide if mankind will not get off his ass!

[robk]

Peter

"Yes guys - I suppose you god will provide if mankind will not get off his ass!" [sic]

Do you mean: "...get off his arse"?

Please answer:

If mankind does adopt all the CO2 reducing schemes, and if it only makes 0.07 degrees difference what is the advantage of that?

It would seem to be you and the climate warming alarmists that are hoping for a miracle. You are looking for a 'loaves and fishes' kind of miracle where mankind offers our paltry 0.07 degrees reduction, and miraculously this will be multiplied and become 2 to 4 degrees.

I suppose God could give you a miracle like that. But if there is no God (as you seem to insist) then you are hoping for a miracle from whom - 'the universe'?

That's just daft!

As Air Con suggests, the money we will waste reducing carbon would be better spent moving folk away from the water if it rises.

[AcidComments]

Also of interest.

So North Dakota has had its first June Snowfall in 60 yrs!

Crops under stress as temperatures fall

For the second time in little over a year, it looks as though the world may be heading for a serious food crisis, thanks to our old friend "climate change". In many parts of the world recently the weather has not been too brilliant for farmers. After a fearsomely cold winter, June brought heavy snowfall across large parts of western Canada and the northern states of the American Midwest. In Manitoba last week, it was -4ºC. North Dakota had its first June snow for 60 years.

There was midsummer snow not just in Norway and the Cairngorms, but even in Saudi Arabia. At least in the southern hemisphere it is winter, but snowfalls in New Zealand and Australia have been abnormal. There have been frosts in Brazil, elsewhere in South America they have had prolonged droughts, while in China they have had to cope with abnormal rain and freak hailstorms, which in one province killed 20 people.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/christopherbooker/5525933/
Crops-under-stress-as-temperatures-fall.html

[Carol Stewart]

Acid, do you spend all day trawling the internet in search of stories on abnormal weather events that happen to reinforce your beliefs about climate change?

[Ian]

I think Acid's comment was fair, Carol. After all, even Vicky Pope at the Hadley Centre in the UK has accused peopel like Gareth Renowden of jumping too much on the "hot weather is proof of warming" bandwagon.

Remember I pinged Gareth for his parliamentary submission? Well, here's what Pope had to say about alarmists who try to use Arctic melt as proof of catastrophic AGW warming:

"Recent headlines have proclaimed that Arctic summer sea ice has decreased so much in the past few years that it has reached a tipping point and will disappear very quickly. The truth is that there is little evidence to support this"

Er, what was that? Little evidence to support claims that the Arctic is under immediate threat?

"Indeed," says Pope, the record breaking losses in the past couple of years could easily be due to natural fluctuations in the weather."

Poor old Truffle. The 'weather is not climate' line is a double-edged sword.

[peter]

Carol

I believe you are right to think Acid and Ian do that kind of trawling.

Notice they never talk about the serious DROUGHTS that affect both New Zealand and Australia.

[Ian]

Peter, you are an ignoramus...

Every time an AGW-believer opens their mouth to take a crack at me these days they get basic facts wrong...

In your case, the suggestion that I "never talks about the serious droughts".

Try an entire chapter in Air Con devoted to the Aussie climate problems.

[Shunda Barunda]

Hey, it looks like it will be Islams problem any way, take a look at this video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lHsn_aUmuKE

[Carol Stewart]

Ian, I think you should include a timeline on the bottom axis of your graph, and update it with data for June. The picture changes.

[Ian]

Thank you Carol, that's EXACTLY my point...ice levels change. If you had actually read Air Con by now you would have seen that the Arctic has been substantially hotter in the past two thousand years than it has now (and for several hundred years at a stretch).

It is extremely likely that the modern melt and refreeze fluctuations are normal, rather than abnormal.

This is even more likely with the publication of data this year suggesting 70% of Atlantic warming (and hence warmer ocean currents heading into the North Atlantic around Greenland) is due to natural phenomena, not AGW, which turns the tables on that branch of alarmism.

Another study this year confirmed that only half of the warming put down to AGW in the Arctic up till now (by people like Gareth), now appears to be human related - the rest is natural excluding solar. And if you throw solar in, the AGW component may be substantially lower again.

Welcome to the real world. The more you venture out of the Hot Topic echo chamber, the more likely you are to be exposed to more balanced analysis of climate change.