Huffington Post Frets About Great Lakes Still Being Frozen

It is a month into spring, and large parts of the Great Lakes are still frozen over from the winter that refuses to die. This all has The Huffington Post fretting about ducks and shipping lanes, but, uncharacteristically, not global warming.

By April 28, 37 percent of the Great Lakes are still locked down with ice that is up to 20 inches thick in some places. This year’s ice coverage has played havoc with the beginning of the spring shipping season, sending the U.S. Coast Guard’s ice breakers into overtime attempting to clear lanes for commerce.

The coverage reached over 92 percent of the surfaces of the lakes this year and is still more than double the ice average usually seen during this same part of the year going as far back as 1980.

On April 17, The Huffington Post warned that this stubborn ice coverage is something that “could affect the environment for years.”

The Huffington Post worries that the ice coverage is keeping fish from spawning, killing ducks across the region, and causing shore damage as jagged ice floes slam into the shore. These are troubles that will “have a big impact on the environment in the months – and years – ahead,” HuffPo says.

Interestingly, the words “global warming” (or its newer code name, “climate change”) do not appear once in the story, despite being the reason du jour for everything environmental these days.

Follow Warner Todd Huston on Twitter @warnerthuston or email the author at igcolonel@hotmail.com.