The weather's boring compared to the Climate!

A title I use not lightly after surviving in the town as a Tornado hit last Friday (Connecticut):

http://www.courant.com/community/wethersfield/hc-wethersfield-ct-tornado-farmington-broad-st,0,2470956.story

Apparently 1979 was the last major tornado around here. A home on the other end of my family's town up here that got "sliced in half" last week is noteworthy and saddening for the residents and community. We and our home are gratefully unscathed.

But enough human interest for now; there may be important news.

Let's ask the Arctic ice scientists!

National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC):

nsidc.org : NSIDC unclassified real-time Arctic ice melt data

The questions I have submitted:

Have you decided when your next press release will be?

We are seeing record-high atmospheric measures of CO2 and the lowest solar activity in many decades in the same recent time period. Recessions have not appeared to have sufficiently stemmed large increases in industrial greenhouse-gas emissions. Current and recent data measuring arctic ice extent track statistically close to the record-lows of arctic ice extent that were reached in 2007. If emissions keep growing, as the next solar maximum is approached around 2013, and with feedback from current and past arctic melt decreasing area for ice albedo (and possibly increasing release of previously frozen methane), are scientists honestly warning the public loudly enough? How quickly could multiple feedbacks result in intolerable, irreparable harm to the global environment?

Your organization is a phenomenal service for providing such important information and data for all readers.

Thanks, NSIDC scientists!

-- Ryvr - Asheville, NC

They are scientists, not editorialists. I'm an editorialist. And they have shown strong evidence of an underreported acceleration of the effects of global warming in the Arctic. Thanks for their work!