From NSIDC sea ice news
During the first half of August, Arctic ice extent declined more slowly than during the same period in 2007 and 2008. The slower decline is primarily due to a recent atmospheric circulation pattern, which transported ice toward the Siberian coast and discouraged export of ice out of the Arctic Ocean. It is now unlikely that 2009 will see a record low extent, but the minimum summer ice extent will still be much lower than the 1979 to 2000 average.
Figure 2. The graph above shows daily sea ice extent as of August 17, 2009. The solid light blue line indicates 2009; the solid dark blue line shows 2008; the dashed green line shows 2007; and the solid gray line indicates average extent from 1979 to 2000. The gray area around the average line shows the two standard deviation range of the data. Sea Ice Index data.
Figure 1. Daily Arctic sea ice extent on August 17 was 6.26 million square kilometers (2.42 million square miles). The orange line shows the 1979 to 2000 median extent for that day. The black cross indicates the geographic North Pole. Sea Ice Index data. About the data. <!–Please note that our daily sea ice images, derived from microwave measurements, may show spurious pixels in areas where sea ice may not be present. These artifacts are generally caused by coastline effects, or less commonly by severe weather. Scientists use masks to minimize the number of “noise” pixels, based on long-term extent patterns. Noise is largely eliminated in the process of generating monthly averages, our standard measurement for analyzing interannual trends. Data derived from Sea Ice Index data set. –>
Note: This mid-monthly analysis update shows a single-day extent value for Figure 1, rather than the usual monthly average. While monthly average extent images are more accurate in understanding long-term changes, the daily images are helpful in monitoring sea ice conditions in near-real time.
Overview of conditions
On August 17, Arctic sea ice extent was 6.26 million square kilometers (2.42 million square miles). This is 960,000 square kilometers (370,000 square miles) more ice than for the same day in 2007, and 1.37 million square kilometers (530,000 square miles) below the 1979 to 2000 average. On August 8, the 2009 extent decreased below the 1979 to 2000 average minimum annual extent, with a month of melt still remaining.
Conditions in context
From August 1 to 17, Arctic sea ice extent declined at an average rate of 54,000 square kilometers (21,000 square miles) per day. This decline was slower than the same period in 2008, when it was 91,000 square kilometers (35,000 square miles) per day, and for the same period in 2007, when ice extent declined at a rate of 84,000 square kilometers (32,000 square miles) per day. The recent rate of ice loss has slowed considerably compared to most of July. Arctic sea ice extent is now greater than the same day in 2008.
AMSRE from JAXA shows similar extent conditions:
As does NANSEN:
Summary:
1) It’s good but it’s not a trend. Only bad things can form a trend.
2) It only looks good because the underlying badness is masked – otherwise it would look bad.
3) It’s still worse than some other thing over there.
/sarcoff
Micajah (18:20:45) :
“If this info from NSIDC is published by any of the “MSM,” it might be a first. Predictions of record low sea ice extent get coverage, along with the usual AGW bit. Let’s see how this reversal plays in the MSM. Will the importance of wind patterns that can push the ice out of the Arctic and down into warmer waters get mentioned?”
If the past is any guide, don’t expect the MSM to say anything if this year’s minimum ice extent doesn’t pan out as a “record” – of course, they’ll say things like “the nth lowest on record!!” following in the footsteps of NOAA climate press releases.
Here’s an analogy question for everyone (please fill in the blank):
David Hathaway is to solar sunspot cycle prediction as _____ is to minimum arctic ice extent prediction.
How’s that Northwest passage working out for ya?
AUGUST 17, 2009
Last night, 16 Aug, we got hopelessly trapped by the ice. Despite a favorable ice report we encountered 8/10ths ice, with many old, i.e. large, bergs. We spent the night tied to one of them but had to leave this morning when another ‘berg collided with us and tipped Fiona over. We got away but the space around us is shrinking. I called the Canadian Coast Guard at noon and they are sending an icebreaker, due here tomorrow. We are NOT in immediate danger. Watch this space for developments.
http://www.yachtfiona.com/fnn.htm
and….
After reading ice charts and making our way fairly smoothly down Peel Sound for the past few weeks, three days ago Mother Nature decided to shake things up a bit. Not only did we have to push, plow, and break our way through ice, we also had fog and zero breeze (which didn’t help move the ice). Our radar was one big green blob, and we could only find leads heading the opposite direction we wanted to go!
http://northwestpassagefilm.com/arctic/
Harold Ambler 19:27:36
I swear up and down that I can see the effect of the 1999 Gakkel Ridge eruption on time series of Arctic Ice. Apparently, the area was covered by clouds so no one can say definitively whether the ice melted there or not, but what would you have above an area of open sea in Arctic temperatures? You’d see a cloud. I’ve failed to get anyone interested enough to actually look at the photos, which are apparently hard to find, to determine if they are normal clouds, or the clouds you’d see above an open sea, or even above significantly warmed ice.
Go, Baby Ice, Go for the Grey.
====================
Experts feel free to correct me, but it has seemed to me for some time now that the ice issue is a bit of a red herring. Why?
Well, the warmist hypothesis holds that mankind’s CO2 emissions will cause an increase in global surface temperatures which will be amplified by water vapor feedback, which will in turn, melt polar ice.
However, it’s possible to measure surface (and ocean) temperatures directly.
If surface (and ocean) temperatures are not rising as predicted by the warmists, but polar ice is melting, the reasonable inference is that some other factor is causing the melt and the melting ice is not confirming evidence of the warmist hypothesis.
That’s how it seems to me, anyway.
I believe there was a 10% increase in extent in 2008 over 2007. When NSIDC and the “forecasters” of future ice extent that have a link on NSIDC site were estimating a high probability of no rebound for 2008 and beyond because of reduced albedo, warmer arctic waters, etc… I emailed them and pointed out that the refreeze curve for the fall of 2007 was one of the steepest in their collection and I predicted a rebound. When 2008 was 10% higher, I then offered my forecast of an additional 15% summer survival increase for 2009 turning their argument againtst them (higher albedo, colder arctic waters in summer 2008). This was before I saw the dramatic animation on WUWT of the real reason for the low 2007 extent – the flushing out of the ice into the atlantic instead of reduction by melting which was the reasons given by all the experts who understand the … heights of the atmosphere and the depths of the oceans around the world so well.. or is that the spiel of NOAA? How fraudulent to report that it was due to melting. Much like the British Arctic Survey and others calling sharp rectangular blocks broken off of the Wilson Ice Shelf a melting phenomenon instead of a mechanical one like the 2007 Arctic low extent. I am sticking to my +15% for 2009 though.
Frank Mosher (18:30:00) said :
Vikes could use a QB.
I agree, they’ve been practically rudderless (or should I say leeboardless) for about 10 centuries now. Sure, Leif and the boys had some early successes around the North Atlantic Rim, but a little chilly climate, er, weather, and WHAM, back to Norge. Meanwhile, generations of Shetland Island spinsters have pined away their whole lives waiting for the ruddy horny-helmeted boys of legend to return.
Not sure Fav-re-uh is the right man for the job, though. I understand he winters in Miss-sippi (the native pronunciation) and of course the name sounds a little too Norman if you ask me.
Oh, and has anybody noticed that we’ve had 38 straight days of Spotlessness, with 10.7 cm flux hovering down below 70?
This stretch looks like it’s gonna break into the Top Ten List.
Any revisions from NASA lately?? Isn’t it about time for another “slumping” of the SC24 curve down-and-to-the-right?
Anthony and others,
Does anyone know what the ice extent was around the years 1900-1940? There were reports of no ice up to the 81st parallel, North-West Passage being navigated and very few seals sighted during that period?
PS And the polar bears survived all that + being hunted.
Hmmm – more ice left than last year. And with 3 or 4 weeks to go it’s increasingly looking like there will be more ice than last year at minimum. And that’s got to wreck havoc on the “ice volume” fantasy when the amount of multi-year ice increases yet again next year. A couple more years of this and all that’ll be left will be extreme weather events with which to promote Mr. Gore’s fantasy.
Pamela Gray (17:40:37) :
By the way, I have said this before, but the ice up there is thicker than bees on honey! How do I know? Wind patterns shoved it together. In fact, if we were to measure the ice displacement before and after the melt season, I would bet the ranch that there was precious LITTLE melt this summer. The graph assumes the ice melted. I am thinkin a lot of it didn’t.
A clear example of what you are talking about is revealed by these two sea ice thickness animations
http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/quikscat/index.uk.php
http://www.nasa.gov/images/content/324806main_meierfig3_full.gif
The first is a DMI animation showing the Arctic from Sept 2007 to June 2008, the second is a Nasa animation covering Sept 2008 to Feb 2009. What I find interesting is that the DMI sequence clearly shows the residual “multiyear ice” left after the 2007 summer minimum is either flushed from the Arctic or homogenized by the Beaufort Gyre until the final images from June 2008 show an almost total absence of “multiyear ice”, yet the NASA sequence commencing a mere three months later after the 2008 minimum shows the residual ice as being almost entirely “multiyear ice” with a goodly portion coded as more than 2 years old. I wasn’t able to locate a description of what satellite provided the data for the NASA graphic, but comparing some of the other images on the site from the period of the DMI graphic would seem to indicate that the two should be fairly comparable. Assuming that is correct, how do you get from ice that is almost entirely classed as first year in June to ice that is almost entirely classed as old ice three months later. This seems to me to indicate that much of what the satellites are classifying as old ice is just thick ice that may well be the result of drift driven stacking, not year to year persistence.
So, does multi-year ice develop when winds push fresh one year old ice together in big piles? Or is multi-year ice just toughin it out from one Fram Strait breezy year to the next? Me thinks, being a redheaded spitfire, that I will bid my blown together ice against your toughin it out ice any day. It’s all in the jet stream baby.
By the way, where are the AGW’s on this thread? They seem to be absent and I wanted to debate!!!!
If we had the technology we could put up a barrier to prevent the wind blowing the ice away to warmer waters. We really would be able to control the global climate then.
Frank K. (16:50:47) :
>When discussing sea ice predictions, it is useful to visit the >recent past to see how the “experts” have done……………
That’s indeed a hoard of LOL!!!!!
Hi all-
It’s really hard to understand people that can look at that graph, with our ice extent curve consistently two and three standard deviations below the average of 1979-2000, and not see the obvious. The curves for the last several years have been two or three standard deviations blow the mean, in fact. The possibility of this happening by accident is less than 5%, and may be less than 1%.
As this ice melts, it decreases the amount of sunlight reflected back into outer space by the white polar icecap. This is known as the icecap/Albedo feedback.
As the icecap melts, more sunlight is absorbed by the surface of the water, which leads to more melting, in a vicious cycle that looks very much like it is running away.
Many, many vicious cycles appear to be starting. The permafrost appears to be starting to melt, releasing increasing amounts of methane- a greenhouse gas 70 times worse than CO2, when averaged over a 20 year period. The forests are starting to burn at increasing rates around the world, and may release as much as 100-500 billion tons of carbon by 2100, and amount comparable to the entire industrial revolution.
It’s all happening, guys and gals.
Just look at the graph. Forget this is about global warming, and consider that it is the probability of your house burning down.
No insurance company would ever issue a policy on this fire trap.
Dave Wendt said
“The polar webcam photos for the last few days would seem to indicate that the freeze up is commencing now which would put it well ahead of 07 and 08, and in line with what occurred in 04. In comment I posted here back on 21 April suggesting that Anthony start a contest for best prediction of the summer minimum of AMSR-E ice extent I offered my own completely non-scientific estimate of 5,857,142 km2, which now appears to be just a hair high, but it’s looking like the number I pulled from my a**, will be closer than anything all those guys with their fancy computer models could generate back in April”
But the refreeze is not starting now, it won’t for at least another 3 to 4 weeks. Your estimate is likely to be as much too high as the scientists were too low!
Pamela Gray said
“Good heavens. A decently educated Joe Schmo, or in this case, Sue Schmu, could have easily predicted a slow melt (and she did too) at the beginning of the season just by following the jet stream pattern. ”
But there hasn’t been a slow melt. There was a slow start to the melt season but since then there has been a very rapid melt that has only tailed off in the last 2-3 weeks.
So Dave’s prediction is likely to be wrong and yours already is. Mind you, so was mine! 😀
Regards
Andy
Extent does not equal thickness does not equal volume.
I can push the ice cube in my whiskey up sideways against the side of the glass. Ice extent is reduced but that tells me nothing about whether the ice has melted.
If the wind shoves all the ice to the Eastern Arctic then the extent will decrease. Will the thickness or volume decrease? Maybe. But a satellite photo pixel count will tell us nothing about thickness or volume and, because of surface water, may underestimate extent by thousands of kilometers.
Thinking about this raises the point that the wind has more impact on global climate than CO2. Now, what makes the wind blow, and why?
Who’s Brett Favre?- Anthony
At first I thought you were just kidding.
He’s a quarterback in pro football. He holds almost every record a quarterback could have. He retired once from the Green Bay Packers. Came back with the New York Jets last year. He retired after one year there. And he just came back again to the Minnesota Vikings today.
He is probably the most famous name in football since Joe Namath. But you’re so busy with this excellent blog maybe you haven’t had time to know anything else.
Here’s a little video about him; you might recognize some of the people in it talking about him :
He’ll be on Monday Night Football on October 5th playing the Green Bay Packers, the team he spent 16 years with, and with whom he broke most of those records.
BTW : are you just kidding that you didn’t know who he is?
DaveE (17:55:29) : This year will start freeze with a lot of multi-year ice I think.
Al Gore will be having a disappointing time with his 5 year to no ice at the North Pole prediction with multiyear ice getting thicker now.
If it “Bad” it is global warming. If it isn’t then it is just the wind. Why does the news media continue to publish activist scientists instead of real information.. Oh that is right, news organizations ARE biased… I have no idea where we as people came to the conclusion that they only report the truth. Any time you make a decision to report one side and not the other all semblance of truth just goes out the window… Sorry to rant I just get angry when I see things like this and remember the dire predictions if we don’t do something now.
Don’t get me wrong, an Ice free arctic would be awesome. Just think of the financial possabilities of not having to go through the Panama Canal… The cost savings in Intercontinental goods alone would be astronomical. But our planet will just not cooperate with us no matter how much blasted CO2 we stick in the atmosphere… Watt is up with that anyway 😉
For a reason that can’t be explained the sea ice graph omitted the 30 year (actually 28) average unlike this one.
http://arctic-roos.org/observations/satellite-data/sea-ice/observation_images/ssmi1_ice_ext.png
In other words sea ice extent is still much LOWER than the 30 year average. Given that we have had two years of negligible sun spot activity, preceded by La Nina, surely slower melting ‘is only to be expected’? But apparently sea ice is still melting faster than the the 30 year average that included 1998.
A nice steady recovery year by year as the undersea warming effect beneath the Arctic ice of all those late 20th Century El Ninos fades away.
I wonder what the monthly PDO graph would look like on a min/max Arctic sea ice extent graph from 1900 to present.
I have made arctic ice chart related to AMO: http://blog.sme.sk/blog/560/195013/arcticamo.jpg
Rick Sharp (20:02:24) :
How’s that Northwest passage working out for ya?
As you know two boats have already made it through from the east to Gjoa Havn and Cambridge Bay already, clear passage through to the Beaufort from now on!
After reading ice charts and making our way fairly smoothly down Peel Sound for the past few weeks, three days ago Mother Nature decided to shake things up a bit. Not only did we have to push, plow, and break our way through ice, we also had fog and zero breeze (which didn’t help move the ice). Our radar was one big green blob, and we could only find leads heading the opposite direction we wanted to go!
http://northwestpassagefilm.com/arctic/
Funny how you neglected to quote the following paragraph:
“Finally this morning the ice, the clouds and the fog broke and we have a clear shot down Ross Strait to Gjoa Haven!”
They’ve passed through Rae Strait and are now about to enter Gjoa Havn, of course you knew that but just wanted to mislead!
Using a more scientific (but currently secret) method than Dave Wendt, I come up with a minimum figure of 5.920 ± 0.050 Mkm2 (95/95 confidence).