.

Friday, August 28, 2015

Arctic sea ice extent is fourth lowest so far this year

Sou | 10:34 PM Go to the first of 23 comments. Add a comment
It's that time of the year again when the sea ice in the Arctic is disappearing. It doesn't look as if there will be a record low extent this year, but there's not a lot of ice around. At the moment it's the fourth lowest on record for this time of the year, according to the interactive chart provided by NSIDC (with my annotations).

Source: National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC)

There are links to most of the main sea ice pages on the HotWhopper Climate Metrics page. Here are a couple of charts from the University of Bremen, as at 28 August 2015:


To stay up to date with what's happening, go to Neven's Arctic Sea Ice Blog.  His latest article is about a storm in the Beaufort Sea, which is undoubtedly breaking up ice in that region.

There's not much more to say, except to express concern that the region is at high risk. Not just from melting sea ice and all the changes that brings, but from shipping traffic and resource exploration. Those risks affect the Arctic and because of the wider impact of changes in the Arctic, affect the whole world.

I'll keep an eye on things and probably post an article shortly after the minimum, which should be within the next three weeks.

23 comments:

  1. Looks to me like the impending Ice Age, predicted at WUWT so many times, has been postponed for another year. Meanwhile, thousands of Walrusses misled by IPCC reports have been panicked into putting themselves in harms way.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Oh and we shouldn't forget that if only Al Gore had allowed coal stations to be built in the Arctic those walrusses could have had private yachts to haul out onto.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. On a week when Dubya visits New Orleans for the anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, headlines we would all love to see, It's the Rapture!

      Really, should I let up on skewering Republicans? It's not odd for him to go back to Louisiana. No matter where he goes, he's at a place he made worse. It could always get worse, Cheney could show his face.

      Delete
    2. well, according to those uplifted in that comic, it sure would be hell on earth LOL.

      Delete
    3. The Reflubs are not on an adult level! That makes them dangerous. China is prosecuting their high level officials guilty of crimes and corruption. We should be importing that instead of crap for Wal-Mart.

      Delete
  3. The recovery* since 2012 continues unabated. There is nothing to worry about!

    *Every year that is not a record low counts as a recovery, according to "sceptical" logic.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Exactly.

    Given:

    A new record is not going to happen this year.
    Global warming alarmists predict a new record low each and every year.
    Algorithm lives.

    Therefore:

    There is arctic ice recovery and global alarmist warming theory is falsified in each and every particular.

    Denier logic.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Algorithm lives?

      I never knew Al Gore hand rhythm.

      Delete
    2. Ach! Should be "Al Gore had rhythm."

      Delete
    3. Damned autocorrect!

      Delete
  5. Isn't this the point where they start to talk about Antarctic sea ice extent?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. They have been talking about Antarctic sea ice extent for the last year at least, especially ever since some scientists became stranded.

      I had a long running exchange back around November last year on Climate Progress (no longer any comment threads there) with this goon Global climate change from a realistic, non-political point of view. who uses a number of socks such as Morgan Wright, Morgan Thwirg, Morgan Gwirth and Sara Wright for a few. Indeed this seems to have upset some who have a FB page for Hyzer Creek Golf.

      Delete
    2. The Antarctic sea ice extent is now below the 1981-2010 average (check the interactive chart linked to above).

      Delete
    3. Ever since the Antarctic extent chart went negative and the global extent chart very negative, for some reason or other it dropped right out of the denier canon. As soon as it goes above the trend again--roughly half the time, of course--it will re-enter the canon.

      Delete
    4. This years record temperatures may in the short term override the salinity effect. But all that melt this year will result in a significant dip in salinity that gives a good chance for a record sea ice extent once El Nino is over.

      As long as the deniers focus on sea ice and 'forget' about the land ice there's always scope for some silliness.

      Delete
    5. "Climate Progress (no longer any comment threads there)"
      There are - you just need to use Google Chrome to see them now.

      Delete
    6. Yes the "global sea ice extent is increasing" people have gone quiet. Maybe the below chart has something to do with it.

      http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/global.daily.ice.area.withtrend.jpg

      Delete
    7. Fancy that. I was wondering why I hadn't heard anything along the lines of 'yeah, but what about...'. They really are true sceptics.

      Delete
    8. "There are - you just need to use Google Chrome to see them now."

      I'll be giving it a miss then.

      Delete
  6. Melting seems very rapid in recent days. On my numbers (table and radial plot here), 2015 is virtually equal second in JAXA SIE with 2007, and is likely to pass it tomorrow. NSIDC is similar, but with 2015 just behind 2011. And Antarctica won't save the day. Despite some freezing in last few days, it's still toward the low-ice end of recent years.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The Arctic sea ice extent certainly does appear to contain some holes. Maybe the walruses are trying to tell us something :-(

      Delete
  7. Thanks for the link, Sou. It looks like this melting season might have quite a spectacular ending, which is surprising given initial ice state conditions and a lack of preconditioning during the first phase of melting.

    Even though it proceeds slowly, I find it quite exciting. I'll have more details in the next ASI update, to be published around the turn of the month.

    There's not much more to say, except to express concern that the region is at high risk. Not just from melting sea ice and all the changes that brings, but from shipping traffic and resource exploration. Those risks affect the Arctic and because of the wider impact of changes in the Arctic, affect the whole world.

    That's what all this is about! Why people are blind to this, is beyond me. It's like witnessing a forest fire and not noticing the wind is blowing towards you.

    ReplyDelete
  8. A couple of days later, and Arctic ice sea extent is now as low as at the same date in 2007 and 2011.

    ReplyDelete

Instead of commenting as "Anonymous", please comment using "Name/URL" and your name, initials or pseudonym or whatever. You can leave the "URL" box blank. This isn't mandatory. You can also sign in using your Google ID, Wordpress ID etc as indicated. NOTE: Some Wordpress users are having trouble signing in. If that's you, try signing in using Name/URL. Details here.

Click here to read the HotWhopper comment policy.