From Neven: Arctic storm part 3: detachment - Arctic Sea Ice

More melt excitement in the arctic.  An unprecedented summer cyclone in the arctic has clobbered sea ice already tracking at record daily low area (58 days in a row now) and near record daily low extent measurements.  As always, the go-to place for sea ice watching and discussion is Neven's:

Arctic storm part 3: detachment - Arctic Sea Ice.

Yes, the storm is weather, but it is unprecedented weather.  It is hitting the ice during a pronounced, long term and accelerating downward trend.  Though Wattsians will excuse any new records as the result of weather, what we are seeing is unquestionably the result of climate change.

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Though Wattsians will excuse any new records as the result of weather

Sure they'll do that, but even then, some of them must be starting to have doubts. The list of extreme weather events is getting pretty long. Now we've got a big fuck-off storm, the like of which has never been seen before and it's smashing the polar cap to bits.

They might be able to cope with "The icecap isn't melting!", but having to ascribe absolutely everything to extreme weather events - while simultaneously denying climate change - gets too hard after a while. There comes a tipping point where evidence overrides cognitive dissonance.

By hinschelwood (not verified) on 09 Aug 2012 #permalink

I wish that what you say is true hinschelwood. Unfortunately, the thing about beliefs is that they are rarely influenced by evidence.

Being a sceptical kind of person, I am interested in this "list of extreme weather events".

Is the list getting long as an inevitable consequence of accumulation, or something else?
Are we looking harder than we used to?
Do we have technology giving us access to data we never used to have access to?
In other words, exactly how unprecedented is this Arctic cyclone? How far back to we have to go in time before we have to admit we don't know if such a cyclone may have occurred?

By Vince Whirlwind (not verified) on 13 Aug 2012 #permalink

Something else
yes, but accounted for
Yes, but so what
Completely
Sixty years ish