Here are a NASA link which shows that sea ice retreated enough to create open waters all the way around the northern ice pack.

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/IPY/multimedia/ipyimg_20080909.html

You articles shows sattelite images but are they real? Do you have real links for that images ? Can you post them here in order to confirm your theory ?

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,574815,00.html

I had to laugh. I read this part: “Many, in fact, have begun talking about an Arctic Ocean completely free of ice. The way things look now, such a scenario is not in the immediate future, but a sad, new record may indeed by set this year: The tiniest quantity of Arctic ice since scientists first started taking measurements. The Arctic melting season has another three weeks to go before the flat angle of the sun’s rays mark the onset of winter.”

I find the unsupported claim that the Arctic has not seen such a small ice coverage outrageous. No reference to any study whatsoever. In my view, this is the opinion of the writer but it comes across sounding as if based on known facts.

Another thing that I noted missing was the fact that the waters all along the passageways are often shallow and littered with hull-destroying boulders just waiting for a deep draft tanker to troll by. These waters have NEVER ever been dredged and to think that they will raises the big question of who will pay the astronomical price? Canada? Not bloody likely. I do not know how the ice breakers make their way through without hitting rocks? Perhaps they are double hull lined, go slowly and have advanced sonar to make sure they avoid trouble?

Finally, what I found ridiculous is the premise that at the last days of August, when this current ice free/ice thin environment has shown up will somehow in future years provide a workable shortcut for big ships? I mean, what are they thinking? The ships would have to enter the northwest passage at a time when the vast majority is still ice covered and wait until it breaks up. If it takes till the end of August, what are the ships going to do? Wait it out up in northern Hudson’s Bay? It makes no sense to start planning to use the passage because as I say it is a far too short period and the lane ways are not dredged. For me the use of the NWP is still a far off dream.

Interesting…as long as the sea ice matched the “median” line, it was called the “median”. As soon as the ice was less than that line, it is called “normal”.

So is the melting sea ice below “median” or is it below “normal”? And is it “normal” to be below “median”?

Wouldn’t it be more scientific to be more constant with their statistical terms?

Links to the maps where I noticed the change.

You’re correct dhogaza, we should just look at graphs instead of relying on AGW experts’ predictions. For 2008’s minimum extent, they mostly (9 out 17 teams) predict a lower or equal extent compared to the 2007 low record.

“Of the 17 responses, all suggest that the extent will remain lower than the historical average (i.e., mean 1979–2000 September values) of 7.0 million square kilometers.”
All correct.

“Five (5) responses suggested a less dramatic loss than in 2007 (i.e., 4.3 million square kilometers) and closer to the pre-2007 long-term trend of approximately 10% loss per decade.”
Too conservative, already passed.

“Five (5) anticipate a repeat of the dramatic loss of 2007.”
They look like being on the money.

“Four (4) suggest a loss even greater than that experienced in 2007.”
They could still be right but it will be close to the wire.

“Three (3) give more detailed reports on regional trends.”
Didn’t play the game.

Reading the more detailed report yielded this . The current value is 5.4 and still dropping so the more conservative predictions have already been passed, it looks like it will end up close to the average of the predictions. Not bad since most of the melt has occurred since those predictions were made.

You’re correct dhogaza, we should just look at graphs instead of relying on AGW experts’ predictions. For 2008′s minimum extent, they mostly (9 out 17 teams) predict a lower or equal extent compared to the 2007 low record.
And that’s a “prediction” just … 2 months ago (June report) :
http://www.arcus.org/search/seaiceoutlook/report_june.php

Yes, the ice extent up to this point in 2008, is about 5% higher than in 2007. But since there was more ice to begin with, the amount that’s melted this year is about the same as last year (thus far).

Nothing odd about that. You don’t even need algebra to figure it out, nor multiplication and division. Simple subtraction is sufficient.

Or just look at the NSIDC graph…

dipole had an excellent way to test my hypothesis, and it doesn’t seem to work.

Basically, there is no discontinuity I can see. The data in 2007 is closer to the 50% ice extent; but this may just be a co-incidence. I’m now really curious; but it could be a problem in my own maths. I’ll double check… no assurance I can come back to this soon, sorry.

I’m going to stick my neck out…

Excellent piece of calculation DQ. If you are correct there should be a sudden and physically implausible jump in pixel count at some point in the UIUC image sequence.

In looking at this, I have taken NSIDC satellite data, and made my own images. I have projected them on the globe using a viewpoint above the pole which has a tangent to the surface at about latitude 27. This gives a very close match for the land masses.

Everything lines up very well indeed if I assume that the 2007 image is actually showing the area with ice cover at 50% or more; but the 2008 image is showing the area with ice cover at 30% or more. In particular, the NSIDC data allows me to construct an overlay of the 50% ice, or the 30% ice, and I get a very very close match with the UIUC images when I put them all together.

Here are the numbers, comparing UIUC images assuming this projection, the JAXA report of 15% ice cover or more, and my own simple area-weighted sum of extent from the NASA data (f13 channel, ~25km grid)

For 12-Aug-2007
36683 pixels of ice on the UIUC image
4469014 sq km projected area
4201452 sq km at 50% or more, by simple count of NASA data
5057390 sq km at 30% or more, by simple count of NASA data
5679174 sq km at 15% or more, by simple count of NASA data
5421094 sq km at 15% or more, reported by JAXA

Some small differences are to be expected from processing differences; but basically the UIUC projected area lines up well with the extent of 50% ice, and JAXA lines up with the extent of 15% ice.

For 11-Aug-2007
47822 pixels of ice on the UIUC image
5882718 sq km projected area
4612971 sq km at 50% or more, by simple count of NASA data
5783576 sq km at 30% or more, by simple count of NASA data
6462289 sq km at 15% or more, by simple count of NASA data
6291563 sq km at 15% or more, reported by JAXA

This time the UIUC projected area lines up well with the extent of 30% ice, and JAXA still lines up with the extent of 15% ice.

Furthermore, I have projected the NASA data onto bitmaps, projected to align with UIUC images, and I get close agreement with the images using 50% for 2007 and 30% for 2008.

I’m going to stick my neck out and predict that the UIUC archived images are actually showing the extent of ice at 50% or more, and that the recent UIUC images are showing the extent of ice at 30% or more.