North Pole to be ice free?

Let's just save this link for reference later this summer. According to the article, there's a better than 50-50 chance that the North Pole will be ice-free with this summer's annual retreat of polar sea ice, and will be all open water.

It seems unthinkable, but for the first time in human history, ice is on course to disappear entirely from the North Pole this year.

The disappearance of the Arctic sea ice, making it possible to reach the Pole sailing in a boat through open water, would be one of the most dramatic – and worrying – examples of the impact of global warming on the planet. Scientists say the ice at 90 degrees north may well have melted away by the summer.

I ain't buying it, and memory permitting, I'll follow up on this in August.