Time for a new icon?

[andygates]

Walruses might be the new polar bears, their territories moving as sea ice retreats and a gruesome mass death reported here. 

Meanwhile in Arctic sea ice news, the melt has pretty much finished for the year and it's the same area as the last few years. 

This year's melt was blocked somewhat by weather - prevailing winds meant that melted ice was backing up in pinch points rather than drifting into the oceans, and that's a major factor in how much total ice goes. 

So, were still in the realm of cosmic doom -- though an optimist could look at the minima and see a fall to 2007 then a bounce back to today, there's no mechanism to support that and it's most likely noise, not signal.

Not as bad as it could have been.  Not a return to pre-"holy crap!" levels either.  The models predicting ice-free summers by mid-century still hold.