By Steve Goddard
I need help from the readers to determine if 2010 will finish ahead or below 2005 – the red line in the DMI graph.
2010 is currently tracking just below 2005, but note there was a downwards dip in mid-September, 2005. What caused this?
The PIPS video below shows what happened in September, 2005.
In mid-September, strong winds started blowing off the East Siberian and Laptev Seas, which compressed the ice towards the North Pole. This caused the dip seen in the DMI graph.
The images below show the current date in 2005 and 2010 respectively. Note that 2005 had a lot of thin/low concentration ice in the Laptev/Kara Seas which was vulnerable to being blown around by the wind in September. The ice is less extensive, but thicker in that region in 2010.
What do you think? Will 2010 beat 2005? Please explain your reasoning.
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On what grounds do you say it is tracking 2005. It looks to me much more like it is tracking 2009. A least squares difference measure over the past few weeks would show it as much closer to 2009 than 2005 as the two graphs are sitting almost on top of each other.
Wow at the DMI temps. They do appear to now be aligning with the massive cooldown that some global models have been predicting for the past month or so. Joe Bastardi showed a number of weeks back what to expect by Winter in the Arctic and the DMI temps seem to show the onset of what was predicted.
The coming week will be extraordinarily interesting to see what eventuates. Even some pro-AGW sites are now starting to bemoan the fact that coming weather conditions may be not be conducive to substantial further ice loss.
For my part I think were too far in now to see anything much above a 5.5 million sq km extent (as predicted by Steven many months ago). Having said this I wouldn’t rule out the possibility that this summers melt season will comes to a premature halt when compared to the 8 years that JAXA has previously measured. Whose to say if JAXA data went back 30 years that we wouldnt have seen a mere 500,000 sq km loss for the last month of the melt season. Or perhaps even a minimum extent reached by the 1st September.
Its interesting we measure the anomaly against a 30 year average but we don’t have a real gauge with regards what happens from say 10th August onwards beyond the 8 years of JAXA data. (i guess the data is probably out there but only the JAXA data is readily available from my perspective).
The thing to remember is that we do only have 8 years of JAXA data that says the minimum additional melt from this point forward is likely to be no lower than 1 million sq km. The DMI data goes back a substantial way with regards temps North of 80N and you’d be very hard pressed to find a season in the records where the temp has dropped below zero at such an early stage.
This melt season with its early rapid loss in May/June followed by the massive slowdown in July and now the late season decline in temps, has been truly fascinating to follow. You have to be grateful that so many eyes are monitoring events as they unfold.
Village Idiot says:
August 11, 2010 at 4:16 pm
Denmark is a small, insignificant country. DMI is part of that. They are holed up just over the tracks from my mother-in-law for goodness sake (check g. earth).
I knew, I ABSOLUTELY KNEW it was only a matter of a very short time before DMi would begin to be attacked with mindless assertions.
Global warming rules:
1. Never discuss the science.
2. Attack the man. (or institution, agency, university, study, data, whatever is needed)
3. Repeat 1 & 2 until you feel you’ve won the argument and have distracted people from reality.
Dave says:
August 11, 2010 at 1:12 pm
At the time of computation, the most recent JAXA 15% extent data available was for 08/10. In the 7 days leading up to that, average ice losses (km^2) were:
2005 = 65246
2006 = 53996
2007 = 83147
2008 = 80737
2009 = 48571
2010 = 54487
Thus, 2009 decisively beats 2010, 2006 is just a touch better, and 2010 decisively beats all the other years. Thus, it left 2007 even more this past week, gained a lot of ground on 2008, and gained moderate ground on 2005.
In the upcoming 7 days, averages are:
2005 = 52254
2006 = 40871
2007 =47589
2008 =71853
2009 = 53529
Thus, ~50000 this past week on average isn’t bad, and even in the upcoming week it’s better than normal and, if it continues at 50000/day, it will gain ~153000 km^2 on 2008 (putting it 82700 ahead of 2008 at the week’s end). If Steve is right and 2010 tracks 2006 very closely (as it did this past week, almost to the digit), then at the end of the week 2010 will be ahead of 2008 by 147000, behind 2009 by 126000, and behind 2005 by 57000 (all according to JAXA records).
-Scott
Pamela Gray says:
August 11, 2010 at 5:23 pm
As for my “here”, La Nina has turned our normal Summer into a “not Summer”. We are sitting in what seems like more Autumn or Spring weather than Summer. This is now 4 summers in a row of crops struggling to mature.
If you’re in the NW United States I think it also has something to do with that dark blue and purple body of water next to you:
http://img23.imageshack.us/img23/2928/klotzbachtropicalfig5.png
Village Idiot says:
“Denmark is a small, insignificant country. DMI is part of that. They are holed up just over the tracks from my mother-in-law for goodness sake (check g. earth).”
I guesse you missed the fact that the whole of Greenland is ruled by (and therefore part of) Denmark, making it one of the larger countries of the world, and one with rather a large interest in Arctic conditions.
Still, no need to let the facts get in the way of a strongly held opinion……….
R. Gates says:
August 11, 2010 at 1:37 pm
Frederick Michael said:
“Also, the Arctic has been quite cloudy recently and this is slowing the melting.”
_______
This time of year, the cloudiness is not necessarily a factor in keeping temperatures down. Certain type of cloud cover actually keep temperatures warmer by increasing downwelling LW radiation. Clear skies can allow more heat to escape.
You’re right but I said, “slowing the melting,” not, “lowering the temperature.” The melting is partly driven by the sunlight itself, not just temperature. The temp might be a degree or two higher on a cloudy day but the “night and day” difference in the sunlight is a larger factor.
In the winter, the radiative cooling effects would be dominant. Hmmmm; maybe that’s why the winter temps are so erratic here:
http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/meant80n.uk.php
…note there was a downwards dip in mid-September, 2005. What caused this?
The declination of the moon.
The wish-upon-a-star thread!
So I take it that besting 2006 is now “officially” off the table?
And since 2005 is the next highest, but only ahead of 2009 by 65,312 km^2, in terms of minima, and that 2005 virtually tracks right on top of 2009 for the next 11 days, let’s discuss just 2005, and let’s not discuss 2009, or even 2008 heaven forbid.
It’s almost a given that this will be the shortest melt season ever (JAXA 2003-2010 inclusive), otherwise the minimum would have to occur on, or after September 28, 2010.
But wishing for the shortest melt season ever, may produce the largest Arctic sea ice extent loss rate (km^2/day) ever (JAXA 2003-2010 inclusive).
You might want to reconsider what you wish for, as it might not be what the warmist genie hands you.
REPLY: Junior, Have a look at the DMI temperature graph. It’s hitting the 0C line again, and it looks like there’s been only a short period where it was above normal climatology line. In fact it’s well below it, and below the 0C line too, unless you want to argue about that again. It seems temperature doesn’t correlate well to “melt”. Yes, be careful what you wish for.- Anthony
2010 will beat 2005 based on the arctic temperature. It is running below average and has already droped to 32. See web link and just his the 2010 and 2005 links to compare.
http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/meant80n.uk.php
Steven Goddard,
to learn more about Arctic ice you could talk to Inuit Indians. I saw Richard Lindzen on video say that Inuits have several words for wind in the Arctic. I suppose they have several words for ice, currents, etc. I think you’d learn things from them that you couldn’t find in text books, graphs, blogs, etc. In fact, i’m wondering if they already can tell what ice minimum will be this year and where it’s headed this winter.
video of Richard Lindzen mentioning briefly the Inuit at the end:
Let’s just say that Village Idiot has lived up to his moniker. In other scientific news, sociologists have discovered that in certain backwards places in our World it takes a village to raise an idiot. In more sophisticated societies, we have idiots raising villages.
Who had the best forecasts for last year?
EFS_Junior says:
August 11, 2010 at 6:55 pm
The wish-upon-a-star thread!
…….
But wishing for the shortest melt season ever, may produce the largest Arctic sea ice extent loss rate (km^2/day) ever (JAXA 2003-2010 inclusive).”
Hmm yeah. A late start and early end to the melt season produces the largest extent loss rate ever. Who could have guessed?
My question is so what?
Frederick Michael says:
August 11, 2010 at 6:42 pm
In the winter, the radiative cooling effects would be dominant. Hmmmm; maybe that’s why the winter temps are so erratic here:
Richard Lindzen in the video I posted above says those large fluctuations are from eddies carrying warm air from lower latitudes to up higher latitudes.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/08/11/what-happened-in-2005-arctic-sea-ice/#comment-454658
J. Knight says:
August 11, 2010 at 7:01 pm
…… In other scientific news, sociologists have discovered that in certain backwards places in our World it takes a village to raise an idiot. In more sophisticated societies, we have idiots raising villages.
That’s the funniest thing I’ve heard all day!!!
🙂 .. Thanks for the laugh.
Jack Simmons
WUWT had the best Arctic forecasts in 2008 and 2009, and looks like a hat trick in 2010.
EFS_Junior
One of the fundamental precepts of AGW is a longer Arctic melt season.
2010 is likely to be the shortest on record.
REPLY: Junior, Have a look at the DMI temperature graph. It’s hitting the 0C line again, and it looks like there’s been only a short period where it was above normal climatology line. In fact it’s well below it, and below the 0C line too, unless you want to argue about that again. It seems temperature doesn’t correlate well to “melt”. Yes, be careful what you wish for.- Anthony
DMI is a weather prediction model, last I checked.
And yes, I’ve been keeping track of it on a daily basis.
The DMI modeled temperatures have currently used four different weather forecast models, with less and less initialization datasets as we go back further in time (e. g. much larger statistical error bars for 1958 vs 2010, for example, we know this to be true as there were no weather satellites in 1958), the four different weather models have been; ERA-40, T511, T799, and T1279.
I’d SWAG that given the horizontal and vertical grid resolutions, that actual observational data comprises only a very small fraction (<< 1%) of total node points used in a typical model run.
From the 2002 dataset;
http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/plots/meanTarchive/meanT_2002.png
we have a direct comparison between ERA-40 and T511 weather models.
Do you see a difference? Is ERA-40, on average higher than T511? The answer is obvious and there appears to be a negative bias in T511 vs ERA-40.
That much we do know.
You do realize that DMI has something called ERA-70 in the planning stages? I'll assume that this is to acquire a modeled weather dataset that should remove any biases that do exist between the four different weather forecast model datasets.
You think?
REPLY: Apparently you missed this post: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/07/28/giss-arctic-vs-dmi-arctic-differences-in-method/
…and it seems that the DMI 80N temp forecast model, using lots of near real time data, is borne out by this observation and data:
http://psc.apl.washington.edu/northpole/webphotos/noaa2.jpg
The melt pond has refrozen.
The data from that station shows the temp slipping below 0C the last few days, currently -1.0°C
http://psc.apl.washington.edu/northpole/PAWS_atmos_recent.html
Seems spot on to me.
– Anthony
The latest probability-odds on 2010’s ice exceeding 2009’s are 35% at https://www.intrade.com
FWIW, Intrade uses JAXA.
David W says:
August 11, 2010 at 7:17 pm
EFS_Junior says:
August 11, 2010 at 6:55 pm
The wish-upon-a-star thread!
…….
But wishing for the shortest melt season ever, may produce the largest Arctic sea ice extent loss rate (km^2/day) ever (JAXA 2003-2010 inclusive).”
Hmm yeah. A late start and early end to the melt season produces the largest extent loss rate ever. Who could have guessed?
My question is so what?
____________________________________________________________
Same goes for the short melt season.
So what?
As we all know that March sea ice extent was, in fact, on very thin ice indeed, vis-a-vis May/June record loss rates of almost entirely very thin 1st year ice.
So what indeed,
118 comments since 11:00 this morning. These Arctic ice posts are hot as a pistol!
Coldest summer on record above 80N—where’s that GISS heat?
Jack,
The reason why we are able to make accurate forecasts is because – unlike places like NSIDC, The Met Office, GISS, etc. – we are not encumbered by a prejudice that “something” fundamental has changed.
Prejudice makes it impossible to think clearly.
Given all the very reduced ice concentrations in the Beaufort and Chukchi Seas, I suspect the ice concentration will be below 2009.