Monbiot tries to disprove Christopher Booker, then admits he boobed

How to disprove Christopher Booker in 26 seconds

By George Monbiot
UK Guardian, May 15, 2009

Arctic ice levels above average? Perhaps the Telegraph’s columnist should take just half a minute to check the facts

5.12pm update

Whoops – looks like I’ve boobed. Sorry folks. As one of the posters on this thread points out, there are in fact two averages in play – 1979-2000 and 1979-2009. It is therefore correct to state that the April 2009 extent exceeds the 1979-2009 average, but not the 1979-2000 average. It remains the case, however, that the data relate to April, not May. Please accept my apologies for my mistake and the confusion it has caused.

How long does it take to disprove a claim by columnist Christopher Booker? I brought out my stopwatch today and conducted a short – a very short – experiment. In this week’s Sunday Telegraph, he maintained that:

The latest satellite information from the US National Snow and Ice Data Center (passed on by the Watts Up With That blog) shows that, after the third slowest melt of April Arctic ice in 30 years, the world’s polar sea ice is in fact slightly above its average extent for early May since satellite records began in 1979.

I set the stopwatch running, pasted “National Snow and Ice Data Center” into Google, found the site, clicked on News and Events > Press room > Arctic Sea Ice News and Analysis and discovered that Booker’s claim was nonsense. It took me 26 seconds.

Read the rest here