A number of people have inquired about the deep red drop today in this graph:
Of course the concern is along the lines of wondering if the world famous Mark Serreze “death spiral” has suddenly kicked in. While people like Joe Romm would be tickled with “I told you so taunts” if in fact the graph represented reality today, it does not. It only represents a satellite data outage. For example see the missing grey sector areas in this NSIDC image derived from the same SSM/I data:
And of course, it doesn’t show up on the newer AQUA based AMSRE sensor, showing now ice extent up for the third day in a row.
Thanks to NSIDC’s Dr. Walt Meier for confirmation.
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Where did the arctic ice go? It went to Alberta –
http://www.theweathernetwork.com/your_weather/details/620/3214945/3/caab0104/plpcities?ref=ugc_city_thumbs
It snowed west of me in Edson, Alberta yesterday. It has been so wet and cold I haven’t even started to get my hay off yet. Might have to wait till the ground freezes now. Won’t be the first time. Snow in the forecast in many places this week. Maybe the missing artic ice sublimated and is migrating south with the geese? (sarc off)
I don’t know where all that extra “world heat” was this summer but I know it wasn’t in Alberta. I am starting to winterize the farm already. It is looking like a cold winter and I have to get 8 cords of wood stacked before the snow gets too deep. Should be a good winter for skiing.
So the ice is back to 2008 levels.
Gary Hladik says:
September 14, 2010 at 6:29 pm
The ice was hit by an ocean liner and sank…
Ok, that’s it. Tuesday Night Funnies.
Did you catch the name of the ship that tipped the ice over?
It was the SS Captain Trade.
Or, how’s about the ship that got floundered on the rocks?
The Jolly CruiseLiner SS Cap’n’Crunch, and the SOS call they sent out was “Breaker, Breaker”.
Gee, you mean there’s something wrong with knowingly posting inaccurate data which will be included in the historical record?
Even when there’s an important political agenda that needs to be advanced?
You guys need to start thinking more like journalists and social “scientists,” and less like “hard scientists.” It’s the ends that matter, not the means…
I thought satellite outages WERE data themselves?!
The absence of data doesn’t mean you can’t deduce anything. Haven’t we learnt anything out of this whole climo-religion phenomena?! Just look at what NOAA does on a monthly basis with its temperature record, where data from a third of the planet is unavailable, yet “modelled” to give global coverage……throwing in some good strong warming bias for good measure of course!!
Why has the Sea Ice Page been taken down?
I found it really useful every day .
MikeN says:
September 14, 2010 at 8:51 pm
So the ice is back to 2008 levels.
Depends on the volume? Hardly a recovery.
Large melting of ice in the critical areas such as the Fram strait may have an opposite effect on the the NW Atlantic.
The Fram Strait represents the unique deep water connection between the Arctic Ocean and the rest of the world oceans. Its bathymetry controls the exchange of water masses between the arctic basin and the North Atlantic. The significant heat flux through water mass exchange and sea ice transport, i.e. transport of fresh water and sea ice southwards and transport of warm saline waters northwards, influences the thermohaline circulation at a global scale. – Alfred Wegener Institute
http://acsys.npolar.no/introduction/impplan/images/MooringPositions.gif
Here cold currents are at the surface with ice cover as an obstacle. Less ice in the strait faster the cold current flows into the NW Atlantic. Negative feedback.
On a more serious (I hope) note: we can see extent and rate of change from the graph but what about the area under the curve? Max & min are interesting but the annual cyclical differences overall surely lie in the quantity of water that has experienced a phase change from max to min, vice versa and overall. Is this done anywhere?
Where did the sea ice go?
Walruses are asking the same question…apparantly.
From my local paper, the Brisbane Courier Mail, pp23
WALRUS OVERFLOW Seth Borenstein in Washington
Tens of thousands of walruses have come ashore in northwest Alaska because the sea ice they normally rest on has melted.
US Government scientists say the move ashore by walruses is unusual in the US. But it has happened at least twice before, in 2007 and 2009. In those years Arctic sea ice was also at, or near, record low levels….
….National Snow and Ice Data Center director Mark Serreze said loss of sea ice in the Chukchi Sea this northern summer had surprised scientists, as last winter plenty of old, established sea ice floated into the region. But that has disappeared.
Last year was a slight improvement, but Mr Serreze said there had been a long-term decline that he blamed on global warming.
“We’ll likely see more summers like this. There is no sign of Arctic recovery,” he said.
Associated Press
sorry no links. Emphasis mine.
From: Baa Humbug on September 15, 2010 at 2:57 am
Found it on Yahoo, “Melting sea ice forces walruses ashore in Alaska,” full version (I think).
Which makes me remember how many nature shows I’ve seen in the past showing the tight packing as the walruses are on land, not ice, all from before 2007 and (of course) 2009. Have these people never watched PBS before 2007? Ah heck, I might have seen that on Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom!
Mark Serreze is mistaken, if that is what he said.
The Sea Ice was gone from the Chukchi Sea on Sept. 15, 1979, 1982, 1986, 1989, 1990, 1992, 1993, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009 & 2010.
In fact, most years, the Chukchi Sea has been ice free on Sept. 15th.
What is he possibly going on about?
Data taken from visual Cyrosphere Today images.
Got pink slip?
For info this site and Steve Goddard in particular are the subject of this weeks “Crock of the Week” by Peter Sinclair. It is about the loss of Arctic ice. I viewed the vidoe on Little Green Footballs blog site. This is an anti-science site now. Hmm. I find it odd that as an engineer I am said to be anti-science.
REPLY: Peter Sinclair is one of Gore’s trained presenters, he’s the queen of anti, second only to Joe Romm. – Anthony
From Arctic ROOS
http://arctic-roos.org/observations/satellite-data/sea-ice/ice-area-and-extent-in-arctic
!!!!!!!!Error in the satellite data on September 13th. 2010 result in a spurious drop in the values for the ice area and extent. The error will be corrected soon – meanwhile the plots are suspended!!!!!
@Mike sander
‘The polar bears just exhaled a huge sigh of relief….’
Disregarding the comedy of the statement, but the polar bears seem to sigh of relief every time there is less ice, and warmer winter weather (funny how some people have a hard problem understanding that having ones cubs freeze to death is considered to be bad). The only reason for why polar bears need ice way out to sea is to expend as little energy as possible while catching as much food as possible. That’s why they don’t really like multi year ice or any extending ice cover but rather patchy ice as close to land as possible. Polar bears go, just like all other animals, where the food goes and if there wasn’t any ice at all, where would all the polar bear food go to but closer to land because their food’s food apparently need, greedy goddamn bastards, some sort of nutritious environment to. :p
I love it when readers lament that polar bears have to swim long distances to find food. That is not their hunting style and they don’t much like the food they find after a long swim out to sea. They depend on nearby sea ice holes, not stretches of solid ice, love ringed seals best (and they just happen to have their pups in snow drift dens on land fast ice), and hunt most of the year near/on land.
http://www.seaworld.org/infobooks/polarbears/pbdiet.html
Note to the Moderator.
.
I was NOT attempting to troll you yesterday with that link to noaa. Just thought it was interesting propaganda from dot_gov in view of your post here on the subject (‘Where did the Arctic ice go?’)?
.
Anyway it looks to me look noaa’s ‘presentation’ of yesterday has been re-written some now? Wish I had taken a screenshot of the original before noaa did the re-write! Oh well.
.
REPLY: Marty, no worries, I didn’t see it as trolling at all, the moderation hold was to give me a chance to verify and get it corrected before some of the alarmist blogs jumped on it. Look for a post shortly, and thank you. – Anthony
Pamela Gray says:
September 15, 2010 at 8:46 am
I love it when readers lament that polar bears have to swim long distances to find food. That is not their hunting style and they don’t much like the food they find after a long swim out to sea. They depend on nearby sea ice holes, not stretches of solid ice, love ringed seals best (and they just happen to have their pups in snow drift dens on land fast ice), and hunt most of the year near/on land.
http://www.seaworld.org/infobooks/polarbears/pbdiet.html
Following your seaworld link you’ll find
http://pbsg.npolar.no/en/issues/threats/climate-change.html
The Polar bear specialist group.
They say “Polar bears are totally reliant on the sea ice as their primary habitat. If climate change alters the period of ice cover, bears may be forced on shore for extended periods and forced to rely on stored fat. If these periods become excessively long, mortality will increase. Such changes are thought to be occurring in western Hudson Bay. Further, if the ice changes in character such that there is more open water, young cubs which are unable to swim long distances may suffer greater mortality. Sea ice is also used for access to den areas and if ice patterns change, existing den areas may be unreachable. Another factor is that in some areas, warmer temperatures and higher winds may reduce ice thickness and increase ice drift. Because polar bears must walk against the moving ice (like walking the wrong way on an escalator) increased ice movements will increase energy use and reduce growth and reproduction.
Another problem is unusual warm spells during the period that females are on land in dens. If severe rain events occur during the den period, it is possible that snow banks slump and can kill mothers and their cubs. Such an event was observed in northern Canada and unusual rain events have been noted in western Hudson Bay and Svalbard with unknown consequences.
Polar bears are a keystone species in ice-covered Arctic marine ecosystems and alterations to the distribution, density or abundance of this top predator will likely have impacts throughout the arctic ecosystem. There is little doubt that polar bears and other ice-inhabiting marine mammals in the Arctic, are being, or will be, negatively affected by the effects of climate change via changes to their habitat”
Still, you’re the expert.
In the interior of BC there are many people grousing about their poor gardens this year due to the extended cool spring, short summer and cool fall temperatures upon us already.
This is obviously a simple mistake, right? The lines just happen to suddenly drop to EXACTLY that days ice extent value for 2007. They accidently retyped the 2007 value or a link got crossed.
From Tim Williams post above:
“drift dens on land fast ice), and hunt most of the year near/on land.
http://www.seaworld.org/infobooks/polarbears/pbdiet.html
Following your seaworld link you’ll find
http://pbsg.npolar.no/en/issues/threats/climate-change.html
The Polar bear specialist group.”
Tim, I looked all over Pamela Gray’s link and found no place anywhere in it that the PBSG is reference or linked to. Did you mispeak?
PBSG is NOT a neutral source for this information.
REPLY: Peter Sinclair is one of Gore’s trained presenters, he’s the queen of anti, second only to Joe Romm. – Anthony
————
I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that if someone calls you anti-science the best rebuttal is clear evidence based arguments supported by data. Not calling someone a girl. I expect better than school yard taunts from you.
http://www.seaworld.org/infobooks/PolarBears/pbconservation.html
Referenced under ‘conservation’.
http://pbsg.npolar.no/en/members/
http://pbsg.npolar.no/en/guidelines.html
“The PBSG has no regulatory function. The main purpose of the PBSG is to promote co-operation between jurisdictions that share polar bear populations, facilitate communication on current research and management, and monitor compliance with the agreement. The PBSG is not an open forum for public participation. It is a group consisting of technical experts on polar bears and related issues that meets to discuss scientific and technical matters relevant to the Agreement. At their meeting in March 2009 the Countries party to the International Agreement, asked the PBSG to serve as the scientific advisory body to the Parties.”
“To qualify for membership of the PBSG one must be actively involved in research and/or management of polar bears.
Because of the relationship of the PBSG to the Agreement, membership must reflect not only technical expertise in polar bear research and management, but also equal representation of the nations signatory to the Agreement. For this reason, each signatory nation is entitled to designate three full members. Government-appointed members are proposed by their respective governments and must be considered for membership by the chairman.”
What exactly do you mean by neutral?
docattheautopsy says:
September 14, 2010 at 4:03 pm
Oh yeah? Then what about the poor WALRUSES! They’re going to start terrorizing the Ice Road Truckers!
________________________________________________
Don’t worry the polar bears can eat them now there are no ice bergs to hunt seals from.
Mike A. says:
September 14, 2010 at 4:56 pm
Where did the Arctic ice go?
Maybe it has been transferred to Canada’s Prairies:
[ http://www.theweathernetwork.com/news/storm_watch_stories3&stormfile=more_rain_batters_manitoba_110910?ref=ccbox_homepage_topstories ]
“Prairie frost is killing crops…
_______________________________________________
Seems Russia is worried too.
“Wheat [prices] climbed after Russia, the third-largest grower last year, extended a ban on exports into next year after a drought destroyed crops, tightening global supplies….
Russia accounted for 14 percent of the global exports of wheat, flour and related products in the year to June 30, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Russia’s longer ban may contribute to higher global prices, raising concern there may be a rerun of the 2008 food crisis, when grains reached records and riots broke out in poorer states. Mozambique, at least seven people died this week in clashes between protesters and police after the government boosted bread and electricity prices. World food prices rose last month to the highest level since September 2008, the FAO has said….” http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-09-03/wheat-in-chicago-gains-as-russian-extends-export-ban-as-much-as-11-months.html
I sure hope American farmers are going to have a good harvest. With both Russia and Canada grain export future looking dim and the wiping out of the last of the US grain reserves in 2008 – Today, says USDA Undersecretary Mark Keenum, “Our cupboard is bare.” U.S. government food surpluses have evaporated… large U.S. reserves may be gone for a long time. We could see a repeat of the sharp rise in food prices and subsequent riots. In fact food riots have already started in Mozambique.