Scientists just now discovered this bit of holiday cheer:

The Ayles Ice Shelf – all 41 square miles of it – broke clear 16 months ago from the coast of Ellesmere Island…

Full story from AP here.

Copland said the speed with which climate change has effected the ice shelves has surprised scientists.

(Yes Virginia, that’s a grammatical error in the original AP report.)

This news actually comes at a good time because the US Department of Interior just filed a petition to list polar bears under the Endangered Species Act. We’re now in a 90 day comment period. And listing the polar bears, which are severely threatend by a warming Arctic, would put even more pressure on the Bush administration to actually do something meaningful about climate change.