The April 1st National Snow and Ice Data Center Arctic Sea Ice Extent plot continues its unusual upwards trend and is almost intersecting the “normal” line. Given the slope of the current trend it seems highly likely it will intersect the normal line with the April 2nd plot.
Other sea ice metrics such as JAXA, using a different satellite platform (AQUA) and the AMSR-E sensor agree.
It is an odd sort of a divergence, this growth of Arctic Sea ice well past the normal start of “melt”.
As first mentioned in a WUWT story two days ago, Dr. Walt Meier of NSIDC says:
“It’s a good question about the last time we’ve been above average. It was May 2001.”
It may be winds pushing ice further southwards in the Bering Sea, it may be fresh ice. It may be a combination. While this event isn’t by itself an about-face of the longer downward trend we’ve seen, it does seem to suggest that predictions assuming a linear (or even spiral) demise aren’t holding up.
We live in interesting times.
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Don’t you understand, the ice is cracking and expanding. It’s thin! Sea Ice Extent isn’t a valid measurement unless you take thickness into account.
/sarcasm
I may have to write the sequel.
Sea Ice Watch IV.
Return of the Baby Ice!
Last year, NSIDC had their ice age map in the April 6 newsletter. Hopefully they will do the same again this year, so we can see how multi-year ice has grown.
I’ve been watching the graphs for weeks now waitng for the inevitable downturn. When the chart first hit 14 million km, I thought, wow, that is a solid season. Time to begin to go lower. Then……it just held there…..then it went up! The minimum this September (August ?) should be ver interesting to track.
Looks like Arctic-roos is completely overloaded (perhaps from the Watts Effect) of is undergoing a DDOS.
The line isnt going down like it should. This is evidence of a coming ice age. All countries of the world must get together immediately to deal with this line not going down problem. We need to increase our CO2 production before its too late! Think of the poor tropical animals standing on their little island of palm trees amid incoming icebergs!
/sarc
I mentioned on another thread, that the Cryosphere Today comparison tool is very striking as to how compact it shows the ice right now compared to the same day of the year for every year since 1980.
I’m beginning to think Goddard is a conservative (tho obviously deserves credit for sticking his neck out well before spring max was reached). I’m now hanging my hat on 6.0-6.2M km2 for summer minimum.
geo (08:50:21) :
Check this out from last April.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/04/15/why-third-year-arctic-ice-will-increase-next-year/
This is most interesting to watch as spring and summer progress. This is still more of a short-term fluctuation (unless it continues over the next several years), but if we do get a positive anomaly, it will be the first since 2004, and that would be of interest.
We won’t really know much about the summer minimum ahead until the sea ice passes through what I call the ‘straits of June”. If you look at the historic charts, all the years averages tend to narrow together in mid-June, with much less variability during that time frame than say during the maximums or minimums. Once we get into July and August, it is the steepness of the curve after leaving the ‘straits of June” that will really determine the final sea ice extent. This ‘bump’ award is certainly interesting to note, but the sea ice will be passing through the straits of June and narrowing close to the other years, before making a final run to the summer minimum. I still firmly believe that we’ll see an arctic sea ice minimum less than 2009, and hope we get a WUWT contest going here to see who can get the closest…
like I said before: global warming is over. we now have to seriously look at global cooling and the consequences of that for every day life. We also need to know what the course is, projected into the future. Can we ask Easterbrook again for his current view?
Can somebody here perhaps explain to me again the exact significance of the amount of sun spots and the solar flux value that is displayed every day here on WUWT?
Well, we all know that the Arctic ice is the most sensitive and quickest-to-respond part of the Earth (according to the warmists when asked about Arctic vs Antarctic). Remember, all the models agree on this.
Thus, if the models agree that the Arctic is the most sensitive part of the Earth and should have significant response to climate before anything else, then clearly that means that global warming has stopped and now we’re starting an ice age!
LMAO
-Scott
But surely it is all “rotten” ice (an absurd term) and shouldn’t be counted – it this keeps up you can expect some redefinition of what constitutes ice from the “death spiral” crowd, wait for it.
We’ve already had the “don’t confuse weather with climate change” excuse from the warmistas. Curiously, they did not invoke this reasoning in the great summer retreat of 2007. The warmista’s mantra of “heads I win, tails you lose” never ceases to amaze.
R Gates,
Arctic ice extent will likely stay high for at least the next month – here is why.
http://www.cpc.noaa.gov/products/precip/CWlink/daily_ao_index/ao.sprd2.gif
Henry Pool said:
“global warming is over. we now have to seriously look at global cooling…”
—-
Uh, Henry, the figures are not out yet, but March is likely to continue the trends set in January and February showing a very warm year, in fact, 2010 could very likely beat out 1998 as the warmest year on instrument record. Where do you see signs that the warming is over? Please share that data…
Judging solely from the line increment, I think there must be a tie-in with the NA weather of the last three months.
It would be interesting to see North America jet stream plotting over the same period, and compared to same years.
What we’re seeing, I would think, is ocean current changes somewhere.
@geo, let’s remember your prediction in September.
Jeez,
2008 was the birth year of the baby ice.
It’s the terrible twos
1) IF that ice is growing back so fast, shouldn’t we be mobilizing the ice-breaker ships to rescue the Catlin Brain Trust up there in search of melting?
2) I am looking at a GISSTEMP map with that giant red spot over Canada and so I remain baffled that ice could be growing while Canada is going tropical.
3) Does anybody have a link to a good article about how the ice growth is Consistent With catastrophic AGW? I am sure it is. i just wanted official confirmation.
Based on rigorous analysis of multi-decadal trends, I conclude that this anomaly will either go unreported or have its significance dismissed for reasons which were never mentioned when the shoe was on the other foot.
Sadly the Arctic-ROOS site seems to be down.
http://arctic-roos.org/observations/satellite-data/sea-ice/ice-area-and-extent-in-arctic
That’s too bad b/c they were showing ice area above mean as of 3/30. In fact, the area looked perched to break over the 1 stDev above mean.
Oh well, I guess it’s all just more evidence of climate change.
Scientists say that global warming is leading to rotten ice, which, together with the higher pressure due to CO2, flattens out the ice like a giant pancake, and increases the overall extent.
Oh dear! This proves that global warming is killing the polar bears. You see, due to the record warm January, record numbers of polar bears must be dying off. And since they’re dying off, there aren’t as many of them to cause the sea ice to tip over and capsize, and then to sink to the bottom of the sea. That’s why the sea ice extend is increasing! Duh!
R. Gates (09:01:55) wrote: “This is still more of a short-term fluctuation…”
No, the answer is, “Science doesn’t know.”
Although, I recognize and appreciate the caveats you did mention.
As it is with many things in life…time will tell.
R. Gates wrote: ” I still firmly believe that we’ll see an arctic sea ice minimum less than 2009…”
This is a troubling statement…as you consistently prod readers (skeptics) to be objective (which is a good thing), you offer up your “belief”.
Based on what?
Your desire to be vindicated as a warmist?
Those that offer wise counsel and then evince action or attitudes that contradict such counsel…expose themselves to ridicule.
How will they hide the incline?
And the pendulum swings back…. naturally.