A Record Is Set in Nenana!

I posted yesterday about the Nenana Ice Classic. I figure the two or three human beings and numerous spambots who visit this blog have been waiting in breathless anticipation for the outcome, so here it is, from the Alaska Dispatch:

After hanging on to set a record, the Tanana River ice in Nenana finally gave way Monday afternoon at 3:41 p.m. local time, netting a Kenai couple $318,500. Warren and Yvonne Snow were declared the winners when the river began flowing, tripping a clock mounted to the familiar black-and-white tripod.

The ice broke three hours later than the previous record, set in 1964. Al Gore was unavailable for comment.

In other Global Warming news, a Democrat Senator took the opportunity presented by the tragic tornadoes in Oklahoma to make political points, blaming the tornadoes on Republicans (emphasis added):

“So, you may have a question for me,” Whitehouse said. “Why do you care? Why do you, Sheldon Whitehouse, Democrat of Rhode Island, care if we Republicans run off the climate cliff like a bunch of proverbial lemmings and disgrace ourselves? I’ll tell you why. We’re stuck in this together. We are stuck in this together. When cyclones tear up Oklahoma and hurricanes swamp Alabama and wildfires scorch Texas, you come to us, the rest of the country, for billions of dollars to recover. And the damage that your polluters and deniers are doing doesn’t just hit Oklahoma and Alabama and Texas. It hits Rhode Island with floods and storms. It hits Oregon with acidified seas, it hits Montana with dying forests. So, like it or not, we’re in this together.”

Of course, as we noted here only a week or so ago, the number of tornadoes in the US is at a near-record low this year.