"It's happening again: The temperature at the North Pole is projected to spike to around the melting point, or 32 degrees Fahrenheit, on Wednesday into Thursday, despite the complete lack of sunshine that far north in December.

Such temperatures would be about 50 degrees above average for this time of year, exceeding the color scale on some weather maps. (Typically, air temperatures at the pole don’t start periodically rising above freezing until at least May.)

In other words, this is not normal. But it's a fitting conclusion to a year of unprecedented global warming milestones in the Arctic."

Andrew Freedman reports for Mashable December 20, 2016. [2]