North Pole could be ice free in 2008 (emphasis added):

You know when climate change is biting hard when instead of a vast expanse of snow the North Pole is a vast expanse of water. This year, for the first time, Arctic scientists are preparing for that possibility.

“The set-up for this summer is disturbing,” says Mark Serreze, of the US National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC). A number of factors have this year led to most of the Arctic ice being thin and vulnerable as it enters its summer melting season.

In September 2007, Arctic sea ice reached a record low, opening up the fabled North-West passage that runs from Greenland to Alaska.

The ice expanded again over the winter and in March 2008 covered a greater area than it had in March 2007. Although this was billed as good news in many media sources, the trend since 1978 is on the decline.

Arctic ice at its maximum in March, but that maximum is declining by 44,000 km2 per year on average, the NSIDC has calculated (see graph, top right). That corresponds to an area roughly twice the size of New Jersey.

What is more, the extent of the ice is only half the picture. Satellite images show that most of the Arctic ice at the moment is thin, young ice that has only been around since last autumn (see picture, right [click for jpg in new window]).

Thin ice is far more vulnerable than thick ice that has piled up over several years.

…

“Even if you lost only half of the first-year ice this year – which would be average – you are still in for a very low ice extent this summer,” says Serreze.

Some factors could still save the day, though. In summer 2007, warm winds favoured melting. “If we have an atmospheric pattern like we had last year, we are going to lose a whole bunch of ice this summer, but if we have a cooler, more cyclonic pattern, that might preserve some of that ice,” says Serreze. Watch this space…

Assume for just a moment that the thin ice (talk about a freakin’ planet-size metaphor) and the weather patterns conspire to give us a nearly ice-free Arctic in just a few months. What will be the most likely mix of reactions to this stunning event?

On the positive side:

• Those who are concerned and at least moderately educated and enlightened about global warming, like all you regular readers of TCOE, frankly, will be alarmed. They (and you and I) will step up our efforts to educate others and get politicians to do something positive and non-trivial on this front.
• The handful of politicians who are already on our side, to put it in crass, reductionist terms, will push harder for better policies.
• A sliver of the people in the uncaring middle, whether through simple and innocent or willful ignorance, will see the endless photos and videos from flyovers and satellite imagery that the media will show us, and they will be moved enough to join us.

But it won’t be nearly enough:

• Those tied to the mast of the sinking ship that is their financial interests and/or ideology will find or concoct one laughable “argument” after another why this means nothing. Expect to see truly endless repetitions of their talking points across the blogosphere, far more so than their already considerable efforts we see today.
• In particular, we will hear how wonderful it is for the shipping and fossil fuel extraction industries that we can now exploit benefit from this pristine underutilized part of the planet.
• Many governments (yeah, I’m lookin’ at you, Washington) will argue the issue to death and eventually take a few more tiny, tepid steps in the right direction. Most of their effort on this front will be expended on the Sunday morning talk shows [1] congratulating themselves for their “bold, dramatic leadership”, and [2] explaining how they wanted to do more but were limited by “the realities of the political process”. Virtually no one in power will have the courage to say that when the voters repeatedly send deniers (cough Inhofe cough) to Washington, you get roadblocks, not progress.
• The majority of the voting public will become ever more confused, resulting in yet another tactical victory for the deniers and delayers, and a loss for nature and humanity.

Anyone who cares to convince me otherwise is more than welcome to give it a shot, either here or over on the discussion board where I posted an item about this same article. I would dearly love to be wrong, and see this level of Arctic melting prove to be the undeniable, undelayable clarion call we need. But I think our ability to stumble over the truth and then pick ourselves up and hurry on as if nothing had happened is even more developed now than it was when Churchill first made that famous observation.