On September 11, 2009 two German merchant ships conquered the Northeast Passage. Because of shrinking ice caps an opening has been created off of Russia’s Arctic Coast. This opening from South Korea to Siberia, normally blocked by floating ice, has been opened because of climate change and/or global warming according to some scientist.

This famed Northeast Passage opening has also saved tremendous amounts of fuel and travel time for several ships. The NASA satellite has shown thinning and shrinking of Arctic Ice recently. Nevertheless, who can say how much of this is global warming and how much natural cyclical weather changes.