I knew it, I knew it

On August 9th, I tweeted twice:

"I predict: if sea ice hits new minimum, #climate change deniers will cite this "unusual" summer storm as main cause. http://go.nasa.gov/QK1P07"

"@ClimateDepot @wattsupwiththat @ClimateRealists Think I'm right? See previous tweet. http://go.nasa.gov/QK1P07 "

So here's Anthony Watts, writing on August 26th:
"Here’s a challenge though: how many of your favorite wailers will report that the major Arctic storm had anything to do with sea ice?"

There he is, laying the groundwork already. The line the deniers are going to take is that Arctic sea ice would have been status quo this year were it not for this [take your pick: gigantic, unprecendented, mind-numbing, out-of-the-blue, unexpected, anomalous, disastrous, catastrophic, or humongous] Arctic summer storm that
ravaged the usually impregnable sea ice cover and caused a 'slight dip' below the previous record minimum of 2007.

Just you watch.
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And it didn't take long.  Linking to Watts Up with That?, the notorious denierati blog:

Sea Ice News – Volume 3 Number 11, part 1 – new Arctic satellite extent record 

we find this:

"Neither Borenstein nor NSIDC’s current announcement mentions the massive Arctic storm that broke up huge amounts of sea ice, making this new record low possible.  NSIDC said on August 14th:"

(Got that?  MASSIVE!  HUGE! Close enough to 'humongous', I think.)

As of August 13, ice extent was already among the four lowest summer minimum extents in the satellite record, with about five weeks still remaining in the melt season. Sea ice extent dropped rapidly between August 4 and August 8. While this drop coincided with an intense storm over the central Arctic Ocean, it is unclear if the storm prompted the rapid ice loss.

Then he writes another article, hoping to find some way to divert attention from the rapid decline (and the fact that the ice is still melting) HERE.

In which he says:

(Walt Meier) "MASIE has tended to lag behind our data and then it catches up as the sparse ice that they map disappears. This year the difference between the two is a bit larger than we’ve seen in other years, because there is a larger area of sparse ice."

(Watts) "You can thank the big Arctic storm of August 4th-8th for that dispersal."

So, AS I PREDICTED, twice Watts blames the Arctic summer cyclone for the new sea ice minimum. 

Now we just have to see if Marc Morano is true to form and does the same thing.