What could possibly justify classifying images of retreating sea ice?The pictures, kept secret by Washington during the presidency of George W Bush, were declassified by the White House last week. President Barack Obama is currently trying to galvanise Congress and the American public to take action to halt catastrophic climate change caused by rising levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
One particularly striking set of images - selected from the 1,000 photographs released - includes views of the Alaskan port of Barrow. One, taken in July 2006, shows sea ice still nestling close to the shore. A second image shows that by the following July the coastal waters were entirely ice-free.
The photographs demonstrate starkly how global warming is changing the Arctic. More than a million square kilometres of sea ice - a record loss - were missing in the summer of 2007 compared with the previous year.
Trying to hide these photos from the American people - we freaking paid to have them taken - is pretty stark evidence that the Bush administration believed that global warming was a real problem, and that they were willing to lie to keep us from doing anything about it.
The photos are available at the Global Fiducials Library at the USGS Web site.
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