Climate Science  November 6, 2011  Arctic Climate changing fast
Effects from humankind appearing quicker than we expected
Extra! Extra! Read all about it!  Sound a bit like a street-
corner scene from an old movie with a youngster selling
newspapers with a large, important headline? Today, the topic
that should be in our headlines, but isn't, is climate change.
Some new data gives us a view of some startling changes that are
occurring in the Arctic right now.  When we talk about the
Arctic, let's remember it is an ocean that is surrounded by
land. (This is in contrast to the Antarctic, which is land
surrounded by ocean.) The North Polar map, with the Pole
designated by the black dot in the center, shows minimum sea-ice
extent in early September 2011. The larger ring marked "median
extent" is the amount of ice for the 1979 to 2000 base period
for this date.  This map and data can be accessed at the
National Snow and Ice Data Center website.  The white area shown
here is very close to, but slightly larger than