Why the switch from Arctic to Antarctic sea ice?
You need to look at both separately: The screaming hysteria about Arctic Sea Ice was ESSENTIAL to creating the “Polar Bear Panic!” attacks begun by Al Gore in his first 2000 - 2010 Global Warming propaganda campaigns.
Melting Sea Ice Panic Headlines feeds the “MELTING ARCTIC CRISIS by ignorant public and even more ignorant politicians and news propagandists - which can then be blended into the CATASTROPHIC SEA LEVEL RISE! (not affected by Sea Ice at all - but who can let a (nearby) crisis go to waste?
So, the 1980 to 2007 CONTINUOUS Arctic Sea Ice CRISIS (as it was actually decreasing) caused the now-infamous “Arctic Sea Ice will disappear by 2013!” headlines, right?
Yet, since 2007, Arctic Sea stopped decreasing! Has not decreased since 2007. So, Arctic Sea Ice was “phased out” . We stopped hearing about it. The NSIDC and their labs and scientists kept getting funded, but they were publicized much since 2016 to 2017.
During this period, remember Antarctic Sea Ice had been rising.
Year after year, the Sea Ice around Antarctica was increasing so much that the daily Sea Ice Area Anomaly around Antarctica several times in 2013 and 2014 exceeded the ENTIRE AREA of Greenland. Yes, there was more “excess sea ice” around Antarctica than the entire area of Greenland. (Kind of makes their frequent “iceberg the size of Manhattan rather puny, doesn’t it?)
This positive trend of ever-increasing Antarctic Sea Ice was so great and so long-lasting than, in 2014 and 2013, we predicted (not too humorously) that the Straits of Magellan and tanker route around Cape Horn would be blocked by Antarctic Sea Ice sometime in the 2025 to 2028 timeframe. Thus, of course, the potential Northwest Passage become vital, doesn’t it?
So, back to today’s (upcoming) headlines of fear and dismay about “Vanishing Antarctic Sea ice”. They ignore the Antarctic when it was inconveniently increasing in recent years, they publicize its loss when convenient. They publicize Arctic Sea Loss trends when they decrease, but ignore the same trend when it is steady for now 16 years.
Yes - It may seem like we jump from pole to pole. So what? That is where the data is. Do not ignore what is convenient to ignore.