Prior to 2007 exploration of the tundra along the Arctic line was an activity reserved for the brief summer months only — due to the difficulty of land travel and the consensus understanding that it was far too cold to measure significant emissions when the hard freeze set back in; also coincident with the loss of the majority of the reporting stations after the fall of the USSR, satellite sensors came on line that allowed year-round remote observations of a number of geophysical phenomena among which was emissions of natural methane.
Rather than a general admission of surprise of heretofore unexpected levels of winter emissions when the new results were analyzed, the spin doctors went into hyperdrive and declared that global warming has passed a tipping point where none had before ever been recorded to where now this revelation was an ominous indication of how fast it had become and how short the redemption period was becoming; truly, the end is near.
Saner voices are suggesting that the permafrost was never permanent in the sense that it somehow remained (remains?) impermeable but it merely poses an impediment to another in a long line of journeys in search of the truth.
Somewhere along the way, the tongue of truth seems to have gotten caught up in the tread of the trudging juggernaut of climate change and we can’t seem to understand a word we hear.
Nicely said.