Sea Ice News #13

Another nice article Steve. It will be intriguing to see where ice levels will be at the end of the summer.
Arctic ice melt is by no means a modern trait and the NSIDC and IPCC seem reluctant to accept the concept of natural cycles of cooling and warming. The start of Satellite measuring in 1979 coincided with something approaching peak ice, following a extemded cooling period, which is why they always speak of subsequent decline;
History suggests you should look at a much longer time scale than thirty years which will put the modern era into its proper context..
Link 1 Ice extent maximum- Depends if you are talking winter or summer but ‘decline’ starts around 1976/9 from a high point.
http://geology.com/articles/northwest-passage.shtml
Link 2 This also shows the same;
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/current.area.jpg
Link 3 The IPCC report confirms this p351/2 figures 4.8 4.9 4.10
http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar4/wg1/ar4-wg1-chapter4.pdf
Link 4 The concerns over ‘global cooling’ in the 70’s which caused the arctic ice peak did have some basis in fact. There were a series of low temperatures in many arctic areas during the 70’s which ice would have corresponded to by growing.
http://www.greenworldtrust.org.uk/Science/Scientific/Arctic.htm
Link 5 From the CIA further confirmation of the cold period during this time.
http://www.climatemonitor.it/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/1974.pdf
As the IPCC show, the start of the satellite period therefore roughly coincided with a period of peak ice-so it is not at all surprising that as part of its natural cycle it should subsequently decline.
Link 6: The IPCC are not very good at their historic reconstructions and generally view actual observations as ‘anecdotal.’ They seem to believe that history did not start before 1979. My article examines the arctic melting in the period 1810-1860 -see notes at bottom of article with additional references.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/06/20/historic-variation-in-arctic-ice/#comments
Link 7: The next two links are good studies showing the arctic melting from the 1920’s to 1940’s; The first shows a warm period during the 1930s and 1940s with temperatures as high as those of today ftp://ftp.whoi.edu/pub/users/mtimmermans/ArcticSymposiumTalks/Smolyanitsky.pdf
Link 8: The second link illustrates reduced sea ice extent during this period, which only later returned to the high levels measured at the start of the latest retreating cycle in 1979 (when satellite measurements started).
http://meteo.lcd.lu/globalwarming/Chylek/greenland_warming.html
Link 9: The melting in the period 1920-1940 is very well documented.
Expeditions to the arctic to view the melting ice became the equivalent of todays celebrity jaunts to the area. The most famous were those mounted by Bob Bartlett on the Morrissey. I have carried extracts from his diary before-amongst the observation are a description of a mile wide face of a glacier falling in to the sea. There are pathe news reels of his voyages dating from the era, as well as books on the subject. Here is a bibliography of material relating to him. The diaries are of particlar interest.
http://www.nlpubliclibraries.ca/nlcollection/pdf/guides/NL_Collection_Guide_11.pdf
Link 10 Bernaerts, A. (2007). Can the “Big Warming” at Spitsbergen from 1918 to 1940 be explained? PACON 2007 Proceedings 325-337.
http://www.arctic-heats-up.com/pdf/Submitted_conference_paper.pdf
Link 11 This comes from contemporary 1922 newspaper reports showing Arctic ice melting in 1922
http://www.examiner.com/x-32936-Seminole-County-Environmental-News-Examiner~y2010m3d2-Arctic-Ocean-is-warming-icebergs-growing-scarcer-reports-Washington-Post
Link 12 Apparent warming in 1969 Arctic
http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2008/07/nyt_arctic_77442757.pdf
Link 13 This shows a variety of arctic warming events over the last 150 years
http://www.examiner.com/x-32936-Seminole-County-Environmental-News-Examiner~y2010m3d2-Arctic-Ocean-is-warming-icebergs-growing-scarcer-reports-Washington-Post
Link 14: We have got this far citing instances of warming and not even mentioned the Vikings 1000 years ago…instead let’s look at another Arctic culture that thrived 1000 years before the Vikings;
From the Eskimo Times Monday, Mar. 17, 1941
“The corner of Alaska nearest Siberia was probably man’s first threshold to the Western Hemisphere. So for years archeologists have dug there for a clue to America’s prehistoric past. Until last year, all the finds were obviously Eskimo. Then Anthropologists Froelich G. Rainey of the University of Alaska and two collaborators struck the remains of a town, of inciedible size and mysterious culture. Last week in Natural History Professor Rainey, still somewhat amazed, described this lost Arctic city.
It lies at Ipiutak on Point Hope, a bleak sandspit in the Arctic Ocean, where no trees and little grass survive endless gales at 30° below zero. But where houses lay more than 2,000 years ago, underlying refuse makes grass and moss grow greener. The scientists could easily discern traces of long avenues and hundreds of dwelling sites. A mile long, a quarter-mile wide, this ruined city was perhaps as big as any in Alaska today (biggest: Juneau, pop. 5,700).
On the Arctic coast today an Eskimo village of even 250 folk can catch scarcely enough seals, whales, caribou to live on. What these ancient Alaskans ate is all the more puzzling because they seem to have lacked such Arctic weapons as the Eskimo harpoon.
Yet they had enough leisure to make many purely artistic objects, some of no recognizable use. Their carvings are vaguely akin to Eskimo work but so sophisticated and elaborate as to indicate a relation with some centre of advanced culture — perhaps Japan or southern Siberia —certainly older than the Aztec or Mayan.
This link leads to the Academy of science report of the same year regarding the Ipiutak culture described above
http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=1078291
Link 15 A mention for the Vikings at last
“…The settlers found that the area to the north of the Western Settlement, called the Nordseta, was good for hunting, fishing and gathering driftwood. A stone inscribed with runes has been found telling that in 1333, three Greenlanders wintered on the island of Kingigtorssuaq just below 73 degrees north. There is also evidence of voyages to the Canadian arctic. Two cairns have been discovered in Jones Sound above 76 degrees North and two more have been found on Washington Irving Island at 79 degrees north….” http://www.mnsu.edu/emuseum/prehistory/vikings/Greenland.html
This is situated on Eastern ellesmere island-Map here
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Canada_geopolitical_map_trim.jpg
Link 16 This from the late John Daly has numerous references to previous periods of arctic warming.
http://www.john-daly.com/polar/arctic.htm
Link 17 We seem to have known more about dispersal of ice by wind and currents 150 years ago than we do now, factors which have a profound efect on extent, area, and melting. Many books date from the scientific expeditions mounted since 1820 that examined the ‘unprecdented ice melt in the arctic reported to the Royal Sociery. This book dates from 1870
http://www.archive.org/stream/arcticgeographye00roya#page/28/mode/2up
Link 18: I supply this link as a curiosity, some of the findings appear to be rooted in fact, some certainly not, but readers will undoubtedly find it intersting. This link shows various historic maps which again appear to show that modern ice melt is the norm, not the exception. One of Greenland shows it as two separated islands and was cited by a polar French expedition which asserted that there is an ice cap joining what it is actually two islands. This extraordinary claim is backed up by observations from an 1820 Greenland expedition whereby locals remarked on folk lore which said the same thing. (see reference in Link 6)
http://www.nymapsociety.org/FEATURES/TRAGER.HTM
Certain of us seem reluctant to learn the lessons of history-in this case that there are periods of melting and refreeze of the Arctic area that appear to follow a roughly 60/70 year cycle. The satellite record coincided with one of the High spots of Arctic ice following a long cool period and we may or may not be at the low point in the cycle-that will become clearer over the next five years.
Whatever the alarmists may believe, at present our modern era is not displaying any climate characteristics that have not been experienced in past ages of humanity.
tonyb