The ghost of Christmas future

Climatologists are concerned that in 30 years the North Pole will be open water.

The Nasa-funded US team of researchers said the ice retreat is likely to remain fairly constant until 2024 when there will be a sudden speeding up of the process.

In between 30 and 50 years, they concluded, summer sea ice will have vanished from almost the entire Arctic region.

Their finding may, however, already be out of date and something of an over-optimistic forecast, said Professor Chris Rapley, head of the British Antarctic Survey.

He said a recent study by the Global Carbon Project suggests emissions are rising more than twice as fast as in 2000 which is likely to speed up ice-loss even further.

So the real threat to Christmas isn't the lack of trees in an airport, it's the alarming possibility that Santa Claus will fall into the sea and drown!

Dave Reichert better hurry up and finish investigating whether global warming is real or not...'Cause nobody wants Santa to die.