While not hugely significant by itself, it is interesting to note that the DMI 30% Arctic extent has reached its highest number for this date, exceeding 2006. The refreeze has been very fast:
Here’s the zoom:
The JAXA 15% plot show it equal with 2006, and a steepening slope:
JAXA AMSR-E Sea Ice Extent -15% or greater – click to enlarge
For people who enjoy old maps including many of the Arctic by the U.S. Navy going back to 1898, google the David Rumsey Historical Map Collection. Someone posted this on Goddard’s site.
Steven, the known polar weather patterns in the Arctic system can produce what we have seen lately. Given the fact that major Arctic parameters (such as axial tilt and topography) have not changed, a reasonable argument can be made that the weather pattern variations we are currently seeing have happened before. Both the double melt, and the rapid re-freeze can and have been directly tied to weather pattern variation. On top of that, there is currently no mechanism that explains a proposed potential anthropogenic external driver such as increasing CO2 to ice melt and re-freeze behavior in Polar climates.
An Inquirer says:
October 12, 2010 at 8:17 am
Does DMI data start in 2005?
—…—…—
I’ve never been adequately given an answer to DMI ice extents (plotted graphic data) historical data. Supposedly, the “average” sea ice extents is based on a 1979 – 19?? average – but somehow the actual “plot” of that average is never presented.
The DMI data for daily temperatures at 80 deg north latitude – a circle (obviously!) crossing the small north tip of Greenland and the rest laying directly over the Arctic Ocean – is available from the link at right on WUWT.
DMI daily temperatures at 80 north for every day across the summer melting season shows a consistent and continuous decline in summer time temperatures since 1958. I cannot reconcile NASA-GISS-Hansen’s claims of the Arctic warming by 4 degrees over the same period when actual measurements by DMI shows it is consistently cooling.
Now – Remember, this cooling trend is ONLY for the summer months – the only time when Arctic temperatures are above freezing. Winter temperatures are very, very scattered and have a very large standard deviation. It is very possible that Hansen has deliberately averaged summer and spring/winter/fall temperatures – which may or may not be increasing slightly – to create his claim that the Arctic is warming. But we don’t know his methods, and he does not intend to tell us his raw data.
Q. why are the ice extent measurements tighlty bundled at 1/01 and 1/5.5 in all of the yearly data on the ? Could anyone explain why you would expect to see less ice extent variation at the end of the year and the middle of the year as opposed to the end of the 1st and 3rd quarters?
When you compare the shape of the ice extent graph over time to the DMI ERA 40 graph, again over time and consider the coresponding bone chilling surface temps at Q1 and Q3 then it seems to suggest that the ice extent may be related to variations in water temps. Are there any water temp data bases for north of 80 Degrees?
Caleb says:
October 12, 2010 at 10:47 am
I think it is interesting how the ice has already connected to the shoreline in East Siberia, close to where the Russian heat wave’s south winds melted the ice so swiftly last July. I wonder if those warm south winds pushed the warm coastal waters towards the poles, contributing to the melting back in July, but also causing upwelling of the deep waters close to the coast, bringing cold water up from the depths to the surface and hurrying the freeze-up in the fall.
This suggestion would be supported by the other image on the CT from 2007 – the ice had also reached Siberia by today’s date. And maybe for the same reason – sustained southerly winds compacted the ice in the summer of 2007 also.
The recent ice extent rise is certainly accelerating:
10-08-2010: 110000 km2
10-09-2010: 110782 km2
10-10-2010: 137656 km2
10-11-2010: 145469 km2
and is kind of exciting to skeptics like us – with a frissant of schadenfreude for the reaction of warmistas like Steve Mosher to such data. But how meaningful is it?
People speak of the “straits of June” – there are also the “straits of November” when all the extent curves bunch together. So a lower September minimum means faster rise inevitably until the November bunching.
What would be more significant would be for the ice extent curve to rise above the pack in November – although this might be hard due to land boundary starting to constrain growth (thus the September minimum is the most significant metric).
Dan Inesanto says:
October 12, 2010 at 10:53 am
And yet, the standard drum beat goes on: http://news.discovery.com/earth/arctic-ice-is-younger-thinner-and-disappearing.html
You’d think that facts would eventually sink in. The ice isn’t younger, thinner, and disappearing. In fact, at the moment it is higher than it has been for the last five years.
I love funny posts like these.
There are two animals that will routinely and normally hunt humans for food given the opportunity; saltwater crocodiles and polar bears. They won’t shun human prey for ‘normal’ prey . . . . humans are one of their normal prey.
There are other animals that normally shun humans as prey but that occasionally prey on humans for various reasons; sharks, tigers, lions, mountain lions, etc, etc.
Saltwater crocs and the big white bear . . . . do not lightly go into their habitats.
John
P.F. says:
October 12, 2010 at 9:20 am
oldseadog says: at 8:51 am “When a bear attacks, he says, you shake the tin and the rattling frightens the bear.”
A 357 Magnum works better. (Per Pt. Barrow whale biologists.)
The bigger the noise maker the better. Shooting the bear through the head with a large caliber bullet, usually deters it from mischief. The sound of the bullet passing so close to its very sensitive ears (it can hear the sound of a seal breathing beneath the ice) scares the bear so much that it drops to the ice and plays dead.
The amount 0f scat that the scientist carries back to base with them inside their pants is usually proportionate to the angular size of the bear – i.e. how big it is in absolute terms along with how close it was.
Will there be another Catlin Arctic Survey this year, I wonder. I’m sure they would love to get back there to collect more data and verify their findings.
Pamela Gray says:
October 12, 2010 at 12:11 pm
The null hypothesis stands. 1. The Polar climate is not changing. And 2. The Polar climate has within its definition, natural short and long-term weather pattern variations that influence ice build-up and melt, but that cannot change the Polar climate or the fact that it will continue to ice up, unless the angle at which Polar regions face solar irradiation changes.
There could also be a change in the various current flows (winds included), which would affect the creation and destuction of the ice. A long-term movement in the jet-streams, or the gulf stream (just examples, I’m not saying they have or will) would either bottle up the ice, leading to a loss of melt, or flush the ice out leading to a large loss.
“Long-term” is of course in comparison to a human lifetime – a blink of an eye in other timeframes.
I would actually recommend a correction (addition ?) to the primary thread statement: AMSR-E Sea Ice extents was also at a record high earlier this year: From March through May 2010 sea ice extents was higher than any other year since 2000.
Some “disappearing” ice problem! It done do be disappearin’ al right: Right into two record high amounts in both spring and fall of 2010!
Mpemba effect?
😉
Re: Anything is possible on October 12, 2010 at 12:19 pm
I see the “website” linked to your name is: http://deleted/
Offhand I think Phil. (Phil-dot) is the only commenter to use that particular address for a fake “website linked” name highlight.
Phil-dot, you changing handles?
☻
You are starting all over again in making yourself ridiculous. And people will fall for it again. It’s an easy job, but someone’s got to do it.
In other news, Arctic Ice Is Younger, Thinner, and Disappearing.
Can we get some journalism in here?
Cheering for ice is so deliciously silly it could give you brain freeze.
Pamela Gray says:
October 12, 2010 at 12:27 pm (Edit)
Steven, the known polar weather patterns in the Arctic system can produce what we have seen lately.
###########
saying so doesnt make it so.
Willis was pretty clear. So is your “null”
Its clear to me and clear to Willis that something has changed in the cycling of ice. That change requires explanation. Not arm waving, not blame the sensor. Its something that we havent seen before. Now we may have seen less total ice before, but we havent see what willis found.
In fact it was so interesting that Willis had to think it was some kind of data error.
So, there’s not “nothing going on” There is definately something going on.
it bears investigation.
it bears explanation.
it could be “caused” by the weather.
it could be gremlins
it could be a massive illusion
it could be a bad sensor ( prolly not)
it could be a pattern unique to the death spiral of ice.
But it most certainly challenges the Null hypothesis.
That null is falsifiable, right?
Chris B says:
October 12, 2010 at 12:08 pm
Eminent environmentalist predicts imminent disappearance of Arctic summer ice!
Extrapolating to absurdity is just so simple isn’t it?
Kath says:
October 12, 2010 at 12:19 pm
Today, we still have oracles…
We also have the ‘Goracle’! 😉
“Re: Anything is possible on October 12, 2010 at 12:19 pm
I see the “website” linked to your name is: http://deleted/”
I had no intention of posting a link to my (non-existant) web site, so somebody goofed.
I have no clue who Phil Dot is (:-
Question for Steven Mosher :
It always strikes me that everyone is so obsessed with surface conditions that we tend to forget that the ice sheet is three-dimensional.
Could not the ice also be being melted from beneath, either by warmer water and/or stronger currents?
I presume we have no observations that would support or refute this, but it seems like a plausible explanation to me.
Thoughts?
Dave Bob says: at 9:31 am
curves converge very tightly at . . .
If these curves represented actual equations they would have parts called “inflection points” as mentioned here:
http://mathworld.wolfram.com/InflectionPoint.html
There is rapid ice growth (steep slope) in the fall through the late year as ice fills the Arctic basin. Then ice (excluding thickness) can only grow on the edges or warmer margins beyond the basin. This is a more difficult growth period for ice and the curve changes shape. The reverse happens about mid-May when the easily melted ice is gone and the intra-basin ice is less easily destroyed. There is nothing special going on, just year to year variability partly controlled by the shape of the Arctic Basin and surroundings and the weather.
Anything is possible says:
October 12, 2010 at 12:19 pm
Many thanks for the link.
Watching the ice is fascinating.
DonS says:
October 12, 2010 at 10:15 am
@ur momisugly Pamela Gray says:
October 12, 2010 at 9:53 am
No, that is not what she said. Read how the Köppen climate classification characterizes areas:
http://www.blueplanetbiomes.org/climate.htm
These systems were initially based on areas delineated by selected plants that grow within certain areas and not others, say palms or sugar maple and so on. Plants “integrate” climate well. Only later were numerical limits added. I’ve not seen any based directly on sun angle as that will change daily and 46 degrees every six months.
Hi! I know squat about the mathematical reasoning about weather, climate and meteorology, but am trying to learn more about it. What I know is that where I live in southeast PA, we had a snowy winter, a hot summer, and I just read that in the 20-teens the northeast may have the coldest weather in 1,000 years. Unfortunately there was no explanation given as to why. Has anybody heard or read this and is it true or false? If true, can you give a layman explanation. Thought it was an interesting premise but with no information. Thanks if you can shed some light on this!