You've probably never heard of the National Snow and Ice Data Center.
It specializes in researching and disseminating climate data on Earth's "cryosphere." That's the fancy-schmancy name for the planet's snow, ice, glaciers and frozen soils, which, supposedly, are melting from mankind's wanton burning of fossil fuels and will lead to some kind of global drowning.
The cryosphere has always been a pet canary in Al Gore's climate-change gold mine.
When any part of it is found to be melting, retreating or shrinking, the green mainstream media automatically blame it on anthropogenic global warming -- not natural causes.
All winter long, for instance, we've been hearing dire reports that the extent of sea ice at the North Pole was at historic (i.e., since 1979) lows and that within a decade the ice could disappear completely during summer months.
"Bye-bye, polar bears," goes the eco-wacko mantra.
But an embarrassing thing just happened to the National Snow and Ice Data Center's credibility. It turns out a satellite sensor it relied on developed a California-sized glitch.
Since at least early January the sensor was confusing ice-covered areas with open ocean, which caused center scientists to underestimate the extent of the Arctic sea ice by nearly 500,000 square kilometers.
That's an ice cube compared to 15.5 million square kilometers of sea ice. And it doesn't mean that the ice hasn't been shrinking. But it's more evidence that the science of climate change is not as infallible -- or beyond skepticism -- as its true believers like to claim. And you might say this is just the tip of the iceberg.
