By Steve Goddard
NCEP has changed their forecast, and it now appears there will be above normal temperatures over the Beaufort Sea for the next few days.
This will cause continued melt of the low concentration ice, and a downwards drift of the extent line. Daily loss has been declining steadily over the last month, but not enough to keep extent above my 5.5 million JAXA forecast.
Looks like it will be close at the finish line between 2009 and 2010 for JAXA 15%.
The DMI 30% concentration graph looks like 2010 will probably finish ahead of 2009.
Average ice thickness is highest since 2007 and 10% higher than 2009. Hinting at a 10% increase in ice volume next spring relative to 2010.
Barring 2007 style winds, next spring should see a third straight year of recovery since the winter of 2007-2008, when much of the thick ice blew out of the Arctic and melted in the North Atlantic.
Remember the “rotten ice” in 2008, which led to Mark Serreze betting on an ice free North Pole that summer? Looks like we have come a long way since then. Here is what the North Pole looks like today :
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Steve,
Did you see my earlier post about concerning a volume map for the melt season? I’m curious as to what that looks like at this time, as that would seem to be a good indicator of ice health.
George E. Smith says:
August 24, 2010 at 9:16 am
“”” KPO says:
August 24, 2010 at 8:12 am
Sorry to be a complete dunce here, but when measuring ice thickness do we measure it as above the water surface or in its entirety? EG is 2.5 meters on the scale actually 1.6 meters above sea level? “””
I think thickness is usually measured from one face to the opposite face. If you measure it with a radar, how would it know where the sea level was ?
If it’s fragmented ice and the echo from the surface is also present then it’s quite straightforward, some radars can also give a bottom echo as well which again is straightforward. A satellite approach where the surface can be measured with great precision then the thickness can be determined by reference to the geoid surface (ICESat)
stevengoddard says:
August 24, 2010 at 1:44 pm
mecago
The image of the North Pole Phil linked was actually taken almost 1000 miles away.
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I understand that, Steve, but it was not the point I was addressing. I was addressing Ben’s ridicule of the very concept of “rotten ice”. It seems that quite a few posters here think that the term was invented a few years, ago as a rartionalization of some kind, by “warmists.”
Jumping in here briefly on the “rotten ice” issue, which I know has been widely misunderstood here. I’ve occasionally thought to try to clear up the confusion in the past, but haven’t gotten around to it. Hopefully this note will finally do so.
1. mecago is correct – “rotten ice” is an actual term to describe old (multiyear) sea ice in a very deteriorated state. It’s more common in an operational setting than a scientific setting, but is familiar to anyone who studies, works with, or lives near sea ice. For example, the Canadian Ice Service defines it here:
http://www.ec.gc.ca/glaces-ice/default.asp?lang=En&n=137BED3D-1
NSIDC doesn’t have it explicitly in its glossary, but provideds a more general term for small, broken floes, “brash ice”.
As with any technical jargon, the terminology can see odd or funny to an outsider. My personal favorites are “gaffer” and “best boy” from the movie industry.
2. I think things have largely been clarified in terms of the misunderstandings between Phil and Steve, but just in case there is still some confusion:
Phil was basically correct. Steve was conflating this year’s ice at the North Pole Env. Obs. with Dave Barber’s observations last fall about the rotten ice. The NPEO is originally set out near the pole and then drifts southward in the eastern (European side) of the Arctic towards Greenland and Fram Strait. Dave Barber was on the Canadian icebreaker in the Beaufort Sea, in the western (Alaskan/Canadian side) of the Arctic (see peer-reviewed reference below). These two locations are hundreds of kilometers apart. It is in the Beaufort where we’ve seen large losses of multiyear ice in recent years and large areas of small broken floes. Ice in the high Arctic and on the Atlantic side has so far remained more consolidated.
I don’t know if Dave Barber will be out in the Beaufort again this year, but if he is I suspect he will again encounter a fair amount of rotten ice, based on visible imagery from MODIS.
walt
Barber, D. G., R. Galley, M. G. Asplin, R. De Abreu, K.-A. Warner, M. Pućko, M. Gupta, S. Prinsenberg, and S. Julien (2009), Perennial pack ice in the southern Beaufort Sea was not as it appeared in the summer of 2009, Geophys. Res. Lett., 36, L24501, doi:10.1029/2009GL041434.
glacierman says:
August 24, 2010 at 12:57 pm
My favorite part of the policy page:
■Anonymity is not guaranteed on this blog. Posters that use a government or publicly funded ip address that assume false identities for the purpose of hiding their source of opinion while on the taxpayers dime get preferential treatment for full disclosure.
Lest anyone should make the same mistake as Smokey has in the past none of the above applies to me.
Earlier post should have read – 1200 miles, not 12.
Alexej Buergin says:
August 24, 2010 at 9:43 am
Are Phil, Phildot and Son of Phil (or was is Father of Phil?) one and the same person?
I only use ‘Phil.’ when posting here, it is a contraction of my name and is what most people call me. The others also post here from time to time.
I finally saw what your prediction of 5.5 million sq-km is based on (submitted to the SEARCH Outlook – I’m responsible for writing the report this month)
Steven Goddard, is it true that you have submitted your prediction to SEARCH? If you did, I applaud you and am also very eager to see what it is based on.
Walt
I wasn’t talking about Barber and was not aware of his comment.
Rather I was referring to the fact that the ice was thin at the North Pole in 2008, and is looking much better this year. NSIDC used the term “rotten ice” several times in 2008.
I meant exactly what I said and was very surprised by Phil’s seemingly off-topic comment.
Matt,
I have changed my region of measurement and image size since the original volume graph, but here is the current graph.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BARZhZg9k1s]
Günther
I can’t find it on SEARCH, but Julienne seems to have. If anyone can find a link, please post it.
Steven Goddard, I was surprised to read that you of all people, who study the Arctic sea ice on a daily basis, had never heard of David Barber. Especially as he has often been referred to in comments following previous SIN articles.
Günther
I’ve heard of David Barber.
I just couldn’t figure out what Phil was talking about wrt to “Barber” as it seemed irrelevant to the article.
mecago,
I said you’ve picked two bad examples of rotten ice; you did. You’re just backing and filling now, but they were still two bad examples.
Rotten ice — a term we are very familiar with here at WUWT despite the preaching — as quoted in your posted link, occurs “early in spring.” This is late in Summer. Bad example, no?
The whole Arctic ice debate is a tempest in a teacup, and will remain that way unless the warmist contingent is able to falsify the hypothesis that the observed temperature changes are a consequence of natural variability. So far, they have failed.
I note that those arm-waving over the “rotten ice” strawman never seem to mention the rapidly growing Antarctic ice. Pointing to the Arctic is typical alarmist misdirection: ‘Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.’
Steven, I just used Google to search as thoroughly as I could the NSIDC.org website for the term rotten ice.
I found no press releases or articles in 2008 or 2007 linking the arctic death spiral comment from Serreze to rotten ice or any other mentions of rotten ice. I found technical descriptions and reports of observations in earlier years. There are many mentions in 2010 since the Barber story was published in late 2009. Google may be fallible here, but probably not.
I find it very hard to believe you missed a prominent story on WUWT concerning Sea Ice or all the mentions of Barber in various Sea Ice News comment threads.
Your feigned ignorance at this point is stretching credibility.
You were wrong. Your original point was a non sequitor. You now bob and weave and point to Hally’s comet to avoid admitting your error.
stevengoddard says:
August 24, 2010 at 1:57 pm
Arthur
The ice was rotten in 2008.
In the Beaufort Sea!
My point is that the ice conditions at the North Pole have “improved” considerably.
By referencing ice conditions a 1000 miles away? Surely that point would be better addressed by showing an image from that year’s webcam at a similar location and time?
Phil.
It’s weird to be on your side two years later.
The bobbing and weaving continues
Steve,
I think you may have years and locations confused. You said:
“Remember the “rotten ice” in 2008, which led to Mark Serreze betting on an ice free North Pole that summer? Looks like we have come a long way since then. Here is what the North Pole looks like today :”
I don’t think NSIDC used the term “rotten ice” in 2008, certainly not in regards to ice at or near the North Pole as you implied in your post. I’ve quickly glanced through our analyses post and I don’t see any use of the term there in 2008; in fact, I don’t think we mention it until our first post this year in January when we mentioned the Barber paper. It’s possible one of us may have used it in an interview before then. I don’t recall that, but if you have a record of it, please correct me.
We did discuss the fact that the North Pole was covered by mostly first-year ice, a situation that we’ve never seen before and likely hadn’t happened in many years. To my memory, rotten ice didn’t really come up until Dave Barber’s report last fall about the Beaufort. I suspect you may have conflated the two in your memory.
In any event, Phil responded (rather harshly) based on what he perceived to be an attempt by you to willfully twist the facts, but what I suspect was simply a mistaken memory.
Coincidentally, I just came across “rotten ice” in an old NSIDC report from 1978 that I was looking at. See the diagram on Page 2 and Page 19 here:
http://nsidc.org/pubs/gd/GD-2_web.pdf
See, we’re not just making up new terminology! 🙂
walt
The air temperature part of the Arctic melt season
http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/meant80n.uk.php
is essentially over. And it was the weakest air temperature-induced melt season since 1958.
It’s all about winds blowing sea ice to where it can melt, El Nino heated remnant waters and ablation.
So much for relentless global warming vanishing the Arctic Sea ice.
It would be of far more benefit to understanding if more time were spent figuring out how Ice Ages get started, and why they grow 4 times longer than interglacials do. Sort of like how long it took for the Arctic Sea Ice to get to it’s big low in 2007 vs how long it will take to regain all the ground lost.
Try to understand the Ice Age/Interglacial process….without going off the deep end in fits of defeatism, as the last 2 episodes of climate change have driven the wild-eyed.
Dr. Meier,
Two more recent mentions:
http://nsidc.org/data/docs/noaa/g02159_ponds/index.html
http://nsidc.org/noaa/iicwg/IICWG_2009/Ice_Objects_Catalogue_V4-0.pdf
and it’s in your glossary:
http://nsidc.org/cgi-bin/words/letter.pl?R
None of this supports Steven.
Smokey says:
August 24, 2010 at 10:30 am
Like anyone, Phil. is wrong. Everyone who posts often makes mistakes. Phil’s problem is his inability to acknowledge when he’s wrong. Instead, he gets rude.
You appear to be confusing me with Goddard, as here he will desperately twist and turn to avoid admitting error. When I make a mistake I admit it.
Can you imagine being one of his students, knowing that your prof is so insecure he can never admit he made a mistake?
If I make a mistake I address it, my students give me high grades in the evaluations so they don’t appear to have any problems with me (except perhaps that I grade too tough).
Phil. says:
August 24, 2010 at 2:15 pm [ … ]
Since just about every university takes handouts of public money, yes, Phil, that part of the Policy does apply to you.
Walt Meier said:
“I don’t know if Dave Barber will be out in the Beaufort again this year, but if he is I suspect he will again encounter a fair amount of rotten ice, based on visible imagery from MODIS.”
______
And if he is out on the Beaufort, (or even extreme western Arctic Basin), this is the exact kind of ice (taken from the Healy in the region just yesterday) that can become “rotten ice” if it gets a layer of new ice and snow frozen on top:
http://mgds.ldeo.columbia.edu/healy/reports/aloftcon/2010/20100822-2301.jpeg
Bits of old MY ice, with new layers of ice on top and in between…quite “rotten”.
rbateman wrote:
And it was the weakest air temperature-induced melt season since 1958.
It’s all about winds blowing sea ice to where it can melt, El Nino heated remnant waters and ablation.
So despite low temperatures, six weeks of cloudiness and stalling of the Beaufort Gyre and Transpolar Drift Stream at the most important period of the melting season (when the sun reaches its highest point in the sky and melting rates are the highest of the season), there is still the possibility that 2010 will reach a minimum extent below 5 million square km?
What if we hadn’t had six weeks of cloudiness and stalling of the Beaufort Gyre and Transpolar Drift Stream, but just 3 weeks, or 0 weeks like in 2007? Where is the thick ice? How is that multi-year ice in the Beaufort and East Siberian Seas – that the negative AO pushed out there last winter – holding out? How much muti-year ice is being flushed through Nares Strait and the Queen Elizabeth Islands in these last weeks?
In short: Where is the recovery?
Correction to my comment at 2:40. The pdf I just linked to is dated 2007, but it is just a technical list of descriptors and does not count as NSIDC “using the term” so much as defining the term.