Ice Age Over, Next Stop: Venus

[Admiral Valdemar]

Breaking: The great ice age of 2008 is finally over -- next stop, Venus!

One month's worth of data laughable as proof of global cooling
Posted by Joseph Romm (Guest Contributor) at 11:11 PM on 14 Apr 2008

A top NASA scientist just emailed me the breaking news: "The ice age expired!"

Even more shocking: the rate of warming this year has been just about unprecedented in the historical record -- even faster than I had predicted just last month based on the NASA data from February.

Just look at the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies dataset. While January's land-ocean global temperature was a mere +0.12 degrees C above the the 1951-1980 average and the February anomaly was +0.26 degrees C -- the March anomaly was a staggering +0.67 degrees C.

(Warning: the following chart is not suitable for children or those who believe in global cooling. Please cover their eyes since the 2008 data, plotted in red below, might give them nightmares.)



This leading NASA scientist was himself stunned by the "temperature derivative" -- geek speak for the rate of change. At this rate, I'm afraid we have only a couple of decades before the Earth becomes another Venus.

My advice to you: Hug your children, make love to your spouse, sell your beachfront property, and then spend your entire life savings as quickly as possible -- assuming, of course, that three months of data can be used for climate projections. And, heck, if one month's data is good enough to get stories on climate cooling from leading journalists at the Wall Street Journal ("Little Ice Age? Cold Snap Sparks Cooling Debate") and The New York Times ("Climate Skeptics Seize on Cold Spell"), three months ought to be enough for front page stories that change your entire life.

Our changing weather climate

When we first reported this story, the Earth was in the death grip of an Ice Age that had lasted an unprecedented four or five weeks, nearly one-millionth the duration of recent Ice Ages. Earlier this year, websites were trumpeting bleak headlines like "Solar Activity Diminishes; Researchers Predict Another Ice Age" or "Twelve-month long drop in world temperatures wipes out a century of warming." Or, for those who prefer geek-talk over bleak-talk, it was time for an "Update on Falsification of Climate Predictions," as Roger Pielke, Jr. put it.

As noted above, even traditional media got suckered interested. I mean, who wouldn't take a month's data over a century's? What does it matter that, as NASA has explained:

"The eight warmest years in the GISS record have all occurred since 1998, and the 14 warmest years in the record have all occurred since 1990" and 2007 tied with 1998 for Earth's second warmest year in a century.

More in the actual link. But I think this is clear enough. Even the natural cooling effect of La Niña is failing to have an impact. The stories of cooling taking over were premature to say the least.

[Junghalli]

I was about to say puh-leeze, then I realized it was a joke.