SIE 2011 update 7: Beaufort Gyre

During the melting season I'm regularly writing updates on the current sea ice extent (SIE) as reported by IJIS (a joint effort of the International Arctic Research Center and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) and compare it to the sea ice extents in the period 2005-2010. NSIDC has a good explanation of what sea ice extent is in their FAQ. I also look at other things like sea ice area, concentration, volume, temperature and weather forecasts, anything that can be of particular interest. Check out the Arctic sea ice graph webpage for daily updated graphs, maps and live webcam images.

May 25th 2011

There's still some time to go before we reach the end of the melting season and see where this year's minimum extent ends up in the list. In the meantime we have to satisfy ourselves with some other, minor milestones. Werther came up with a good one: Will this year's IJIS SIE trend line dive below the 11 million mark before the end of the month? If it does, it would be for the first time in the IJIS dataset.

To be fair, I was expecting the SIE number to decrease faster than it did, based on the setting up of the Beaufort Gyre. This is one of the things that made 2007 such a big sea ice loss year. For weeks on end the Beaufort Gyre kept turning in a clockwise fashion and churned the sea ice as well as transported it to the North Atlantic (with the help of the Transpolar Drift Stream) where it melted out.

It was naive of me to think that this would immediately lead to bigger daily SIE decreases. These things always need a bit of time, until the shift in conditions is done. In this case the cold air cleared from the Canadian side, winds started to blow the ice pack away from the Canadian and Alaskan coast, and a semi-static high pressure area was bringing clear skies for the eternal sun to shine in.

But this also meant, of course, that things slowed down on the Siberian side, which up till now had been the place where all the action was. And so SIE decrease slowed down a bit as well right after the last SIE update, but just for a couple of days and just below the monthly average, which means the curve is still smoothly going down.

In fact things have speeded up a bit in the past few days. If this keeps up the 11 million mark should be in sight by the end of the month.

Sea ice extent (SIE)

Here's the IJIS SIE graph:

The current difference between 2011 and the other years is as follows:

• 2005: -314(-44,778)
• 2006: +65K (-43,432)
• 2007: -163K (-41,991)
• 2008: -324K (-45,373)
• 2009: -398K (-53,952)
• 2010: +14K (-67,661)

Between brackets is the average daily extent rate for the month of May. 2011's average daily extent rate for May is currently -53,862 square kilometers, which is virtually the same as 2009. This year's trend line is now very close to 2006 (which is a contender no more after this month) and it has increased its lead over other years as well, except over 2009 and 2010. The latter has even crept in front and will soon take the lead.

There is 363K square km to go to the 11 million mark. With 6 days to go, this means an average of 60K per day should do the trick. The average for the last 3 days was 70K.

Sea ice area (SIA) and CryosphereToday area per IJIS extent (CAPIE)

It's getting boring, but the trend line on the Cryosphere Today SIA anomaly graph is still hovering around the minus 1 million square km mark, slightly under it at the moment due to a spurt in SIA decrease:

Things are at a bit of a standstill in the East Siberian Sea, Kara Sea and Laptev Sea. But this is compensated by a sharp drop on the other side, in the Beaufort Sea. The Bering Sea has almost reached the bottom of the graph (quite soon this year, as I'll show in a follow-up post to this one at the end of the month) and this is also having a notable effect on the Chukchi Sea. Hudson Bay and Baffin/Newfoundland Bay are showing reasonably normal drops. Hudson is even a bit slow, but will probably start to melt out very quickly any minute now.

Because SIA is still dropping a tad faster than SIE, this means that our compactness graph (or CAPIE) still shows 2011 to be relatively low compared to other years:

If the Beaufort Gyre stays a feature for a while longer I think SIE might go down as fast as SIA, which means other years will start to catch up. 2008 stays very low in June and will soon be followed by 2007.

Beaufort Gyre and air temperatures

I've made a short animation of the PIPS ice displacement maps to show how the Beaufort Gyre started to rotate right after the last SIE update:

Unfortunately there haven't been any new maps lately, which makes it a bit more difficult to ascertain whether the Beaufort Gyre is still gyring. But high pressure areas are currently still dominating the Canadian Archipelago and Beaufort Sea, so it probably is churning that ice away from the North American coast as we speak:

According to the ECMWF forecast things could be shifting again in 2-3 days. This might cause a slow down in SIE and SIA decreases.

The effect of these high-pressure areas has also become visible on temperature maps. I have made another animation of the visually pleasant DMI temperature map that shows how the Arctic is slowly warming up under the long hours of sunshine. The blues are gone and the greens are slowly turning to yellow, meaning we are approaching 0 degrees C over much of the Arctic:

This blink comparison of the NOAA/ESRL temperature anomaly maps of May 14th and May 25th also shows how things have changed quite radically in the past 10 days or so:

Update conclusion

If we focus on the 11 million mark, we have an exciting last six May days ahead of us. The current average is enough to break through it, but if weather patterns do shift in the next couple of days, things might slow enough for the 11 million mark to remain June territory. The 10 million mark is there too, as is the 9 million mark which was passed for the first time in June last year.

But not looking too far ahead, we can safely conclude that the stage is set for temperatures that are no longer freezing. Even at the North Pole the 0 degree C line is now in sight:

 

TIPS - Other blog posts and news articles concerning the Arctic and its ice:

Comments

[Patrice Pustavrh]

Hi, I'll just add to your post regarding the NP temps: I've been checking NOAA webcams and internal bouys temps have been above 0 deg C for couple of days. I am not sure how good these measurements, but in absence of direct sunlight, they could well reflect actual outside temperature (please correct me if I am wrong).

[Neven]

Thanks for the info, Patrice! I just had a look: 3 and 5.5 degrees C. That's quite some hot air.

[Christoffer Ladstein]

I've been keeping an eye at the internal temps at the North Pole devices, and they are regularly several degrees above freezing point, but despite this, the pictures proves the opposite, I have seen no proof of water pools yet. So in my opinion, these instruments absorb external rays/heat rather easy, maybe a good and foolproof thing to make them working?!

Nice update, neven, as always!

Summer is close, in the northern hemisphere that is, and both seaice and glaciers will truly start shivering in "angst" the next weeks, exciting that will be !

[Andrew Xnn]

Florida State Center for Ocean-Atmospheric studies has a nice map of Arctic Temperature Anomalies:

http://www.coaps.fsu.edu/~maue/extreme/gfs/current/nh_raw_temp_000.png

It currently shows significantly above average temperatures across most of the Arctic Ocean and immediately adjoining seas. The most severe warming is actually along the coast of central Siberia.

Temperatures around the Hudson Bay continue to remain at or below normal as do the Baffin and Greenland Seas.

This suggest a flow of warm air from central Asia that is in turn pushing cooler air towards the cooler areas mentioned.

[Christoffer Ladstein]

That map, Andrew, can't tell the whole truth. About Alaska. I can tell by sailwx.info that places not far away from Fairbanks report temps at 27,2 C, and if that is normal, then I better start packing... As an anecdote I may mention that last summer max temp in Oslo didn't exceed 26,2 C, so in a few more years nobody will remember that summer. On the other hand, further south and east they experienced a tormenting heatwawe, we all remember what took place in Russia, leading to a ban on wheat export!?
Andrew, do you by chance have a map to show of fires taking place in Northern siberia, they must be increasing in numbers as we speak, littering the seaice further north with dirty ash, escalating the melting rapidly....?!

[Arcticio]

http://www.arctic.io/observations/8/2011-05-25/6-N72.544576-W135.871955

The ice is melting rapidly in Beaufort Sea. Wind of 15°c and more turns usually white areas into blue-ish - the first time this year - from a satellite's view. Infrared also indicate heavy surface melting.

However, pressure patterns are changing and the temperature hotspot seems to move to Laptev Sea the next days.

http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/map/images/ens/t850std_nh_alltimes.html

But the fragmentation of sea ice is higher now in 2011. Why we are looking at the extent and forget about the volume. Are 11.01 sqkm not scary, given the volume is below 2010?

[Neven]

Welcome, Arcticio (love the name and the avatar).

However, pressure patterns are changing and the temperature hotspot seems to move to Laptev Sea the next days.

Yes, ECMWF forecasts the same for the next 2-3. The high might move back again after that, but these 5-7 day forecasts aren't very reliable, as they can change very quickly.

But the fragmentation of sea ice is higher now in 2011. Why we are looking at the extent and forget about the volume. Are 11.01 sqkm not scary, given the volume is below 2010?

I just had a look at McClure Strait etc compared to last year. Last year was pretty Barbery already, but this year seems a tad worse when it comes to how the ice pack itself looks. On the other hand, in 2010 a lot of fast ice had already broken up by now in McClure Strait and the other broad channel just south of it (for the indirect NW Passage; I'm too lazy to look it up).

Anyway, I try not to think too much about volume until CryoSat-2 data starts rolling in.

[Andrew Xnn]

Christoffer;

temperatures do change....

Here is how things look a few hours later.
Notice, that the Fairbanks area is now between 12 to maybe 20 F above normal. So, maybe those temps are 10C above normal.

Hudson Bay across to Atlantic remain below normal.

[Artful Dodger]

Regarding Internal temperatures for the NOAA webcams on the sea ice near the North Pole, these camera enclosures have built-in electric heaters to prevent fogging of the optics. The temps displayed are not ambient air temperature. A Commenter on this blog wrote about the equipment at length last year.

[Rob Dekker]

Thank you for another fascinating post, Neven. I've been following your Arctic reports since Feb only, and I'm amazed as how much I learn simply reading your blogs and the comments of the great folks here. It's exciting to go through this melting season with the community you have enabled.

Regarding PIPS, I also noticed they stopped reporting ice thickness a couple of days ago. May it be because that's when the Beaufort sea started opening up, where PIPS was still showing 2.5-3 meter ice ? Just a guess though. Maybe the ice stacked up elsewhere ? Or maybe PIPS is not really that good in estimating ice thinkness (I recall your post on the Cryosat validation measurement that found 1.8 meter ice where PIPS estimated 4 meters).

[Neven]

Regarding Internal temperatures for the NOAA webcams on the sea ice near the North Pole, these camera enclosures have built-in electric heaters to prevent fogging of the optics. The temps displayed are not ambient air temperature. A Commenter on this blog wrote about the equipment at length last year.

That's right! I had forgotten about that one. I've been looking for those comments, but couldn't find them unfortunately.

Thank you for another fascinating post, Neven. I've been following your Arctic reports since Feb only, and I'm amazed as how much I learn simply reading your blogs and the comments of the great folks here. It's exciting to go through this melting season with the community you have enabled.

Thanks, Rob. If everyone shares what he or she knows, I think we'll have a great little beehive to interpret what is going up there. It is making the learning curve much less steep for everyone.

The Arctic Sea Ice blog has been up for almost a year now (I'll do a blog post on that this weekend) and so we now have a collective reference frame. Next year will be even better.

Regarding PIPS, I also noticed they stopped reporting ice thickness a couple of days ago. May it be because that's when the Beaufort sea started opening up, where PIPS was still showing 2.5-3 meter ice ? Just a guess though.

No, I think that's a regular feature, and they don't mind it because PIPS isn't meant to be accurate as the Navy has much better models. If it was just about thickness accuracy they'd still be showing the ice displacement maps.

Notice also that DMI doesn't update the ice drift product between May and September (both month inclusive), due to dubious quality during ice surface melt. So maybe this is just a period where data isn't good or complete enough to update the forecast maps. Or something is broke and nobody has noticed yet.

[Werther]

One thing I can’t resist to share with you, is the sense of sheer beauty, revealed to us through MODIS. Just look at the Lena unfolding today through the ice and snow. The urging danger of change as we project what’s coming, mingled with breathless wonder on the momentary beauty of what we can see (and loose?).

[Neven]

I can totally relate to that feeling. I'm still in awe when watching those satellite images. I even feel proud when I show them to someone else!

BTW, Werther, for a minute I thought the average needed to break through 11 million was screwed, when I saw the reported SIE decrease this morning (just 70K). But the revision wasn't as drastic as usual, so with an average of 61K the coming 5 days the record is still within reach.

Shifting weather conditions could throw a spanner in the works though (just like last year).

[Christoffer Ladstein]

But with less volume for every year that go by, ice becomes thinner, and that's why we're likely to see some extreme nosedips in both extent and area, shortly!

Still, I hardly grasp it how FAST ice vanish from one day to the other, make that area into footballfields.....

[Werther]

I like some competition. It distracts the mind. But of course, in the big picture, it doesn’t really matter whether may 2011 sets a record or not.
As you said yesterday, Neven, 2010 looked barberish, especially around the Archipelago and the Baffin bay. This year the sit is bad in the Okhotsk, Bering and Kara Seas. And the melt pools on the floes in front of the Mackenzie delta are amazing (a picture almost as beautiful as the Lena today).
Rob wondered where the thick PIPS ice on the Alaska coast might have gone. As I see it, there wasn’t any. The real battle is fought right now from down under (no relation to our stubby outback friends).
I think volume can be explored through the number and width of leads, spread and dimensions of floes, through CAPIE, the impact of winds and reaction time of the pack to weather change. All of that doesn’t look good, though extent isn’t affected really exceptional (yet). In some ways, it looks like our speculations on a theoretically limit function (endless spread of infinitely thinning ice) holds some truth.
Interesting was the flip-flop around Novaya Zemlya since march. Also, ever changing ‘shadow’ of icefree polynias around Ostrov Wrangelyja, Vize, Frantza Yosefa and so on. The pack is mobile, and probably much more in decline in volume by now than by extent.

[Werther]

Referring to Wayne Kernochan’s bankable store, I think of it this way. In 8-28 cubic K of sea ice a large bank-account of energy was invested. Now that it declined to 4-20 cubic K, a lot of that energy is released, to be invested in other and unpredictable projects. Along with that of other driving hotspots, like the Inter Tropical Convection Zone, the arctic release is reflected in obvious change of pattern, timing and intensity of most atmospheric phenomena. Like Tamino said on his blog (hell and high water), it’s time to stop reticence and relate what’s happening to AGW.
Our survival is ultimately dependent on a fragile relation to the planet’s thin biosphere, though a brief episode of seemingly unlimited fossil energy supply made us forget. Without that, we are like our ancestors losing their stone tools, sadly forced on a final, ecological reel....

I seem to have an evening of contemplacy, I’m off to sleep before it gets too general (please send some good scientific info).

[Arcticio]

Neven, thanks for the warm welcome. I really enjoy your deep discussions here.

Indeed, you're right, without real data volume remains elusive. However, the longer the validation campaign goes the outcome will be more bulletproof and eventually grounding.

[logicman]

"One thing I can’t resist to share with you, is the sense of sheer beauty, revealed to us through MODIS."
Every day, Werther, every day!

Re: heaters in camera enclosures - I gave a link to the manufacturers web site in a comment last year:
http://neven1.typepad.com/blog/2010/07/animation-8-kangerdlugssuaq-glacier.html

Manufacturer:
http://www.oceantronics.net/NOAA.htm

hth
:-)

[Artful Dodger]

Patrick, we should have sensed your friendly hand on the narrow shoulders of Truth! Cheers, Mate!

[Kevin McKinney]

Preliminary IJIS value is 11231875 km2--over 70k again, and within 10k of the (rapidly fading) 2006. We'll see what the revision holds in the morning. (Part of the fun of this blog is the international thing; it's still 5/27 here.)

And so to bed, as Mr. Pepys used to write. . .

[Artful Dodger]

Werther wrote:

(please send some good scientific info)

How about Articles related to Notz & Wettlaufer (2005) "A non-destructive method for measuring the salinity and solid fraction of growing sea ice in situ", J.Glaciology

Very tasty... :^)

[Werther]

Right, I’m back with my first coffee. Lodger, thanks. ‘...the bulk salinity in ice-core studies is significantly underestimated in the lower parts of the cores.’; would that indicate the salinity of the upper layer of arctic ocean water is rising? What does a lot more of brine in the lower part of 1.8 m thick sea ice do, especially in the end of may?
Is there a scientific basis to the assumption that the melt is driven from down under? In that case, it’s nice to watch the extent/surface through MODIS, but the SSRN Seaview (do you remember the seventies TV series?) would be where the real action is.

[Artful Dodger]

g'morning Werther. I think I'll grind some Kona for meself... ;^)

The salinity gradient in sea ice is a consequence of the brine rejection process. As the Ice freezes, saltier remaining liquid becomes denser and sinks, migrating down through the sea ice, and eventually out the bottom.

Dr. Wieslaw Maslowski's numerical model shows heat fluxes into the Arctic from the Atlantic and Pacific. His work, and others, show that about 60% of past sea ice loss is due to increased heat inflows, mostly from the Atlantic. By definition, this is 'bottom-melt'.

For the Pacific, see Woodgate, Weingartner, and Lindsay (2009) "The 2007 Bering Strait oceanic heat flux and anomalous Arctic sea-ice retreat", Geophysical Research Letters. They show how Pacific inflow volume and temp increased from 2001 to 2007 giving a heat flux 5–6 x 10^20 Joules. This is twice or more the normal Pacific heat inflow, and was the trigger for the 2007 record low sea ice minimum, not anomalous winds as some claim.

[Daniel Bailey]

@ Artful Dodger

I'm a Papua New Guinea (medium roast) fan meself.

Thanks for the link to Woodgate, Weingartner, and Lindsay (2009). Hadn't yet read that one.

[Christoffer Ladstein]

Never underestimate the power of coffee:-).

I'll brew today's last coffee in a few minutes, but first a few words upon the Pscific inflow volume...
This year show an early opening of the bering strait, and the temp-anomaly for that part rises accordingly, so would this lead henceforth to similar conditions as in 2007?! Only time will tell....
I do enjoy the international feeling in this blog, put personally I find national borders to be meaningless when comes to subjects as we're discussing!

[Oslo]

Werther wrote:

- Is there a scientific basis to the assumption that the melt is driven from down under?

Donald Perovich argues that reduced sea ice in the arctic leads to more solar input which leads to more melting - a classic ice albedo feedback.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i5T5UsPSBO4

This leads to more bottom melting according to Don.

[Oslo]

>This leads to more bottom melting according to Don.

My understanding is that the ice albedo feedback is much stronger than the relatively weak forcing from CO2 each year - so a small change in CO2 each year leads to a small change in temperature in the arctic which reduces the ice cover (stronger from bottom than on surface), and in response trigger a much bigger temperature change and ice cover than CO2 alone would produce. This of course would implicate that the loss of sea ice seasonally in the Arctic would probably lead to a much stronger response than our understanding so far (I'm arguing that the ice albedo feedback is underestimated, also confirmed by a study published earlier this year).

[Account Deleted]

I agree about the international feel Chris. This is the only blog that I frequent. I almost enjoy reading the comments/discussion as much as Neven posting.
I'm a Kopi Tenom (Tenom Coffee) drinker - pure Coffea canephora so about twice as strong as Arabica coffee.

[Artful Dodger]

Daniel, here is the Moored Buoy Program hosted on NOAA's National Data Buoy Center. I understand there is a bottom-moored array in the Bering Strait. Presumably these instruments would detect increased heat influx to the Chukchi Sea...

[Timothy Chase]

Colin Maycock wrote:

I agree about the international feel Chris. This is the only blog that I frequent. I almost enjoy reading the comments/discussion as much as Neven posting.

This isn't the only blog I frequent. There are a few others that I typically visit each day, whether I comment on them or not. Mostly not as I try to comment only when I have something to contribute.

But when I saw this blog was open for business again it really lifted my spirits. Something to look forward to each day until October. And yes, the comments are often quite informative in themselves.

Six shots espresso over ice.

[Rob Dekker]

Hi guys,

The discussion above about the early opening of the Bering Strait reminded me to dig up the story of the Nautilus in 1958.

If you recall, the Nautilus was the first submarine to pass over (under?) the North Pole. In it's voyage from the Pacific to the Atlantic, it had to pass the Bering Strait, and noteworthy is that it needed two attempts to get through. The first attempt was in June, which failed due to massive ice flows 30 ft below sea level.

The link and an excerpt from this June 1958 attempt is below, but when was the last time that we had the Bering Strait blocked by 30 ft+ thick ice...in June ?

http://www.navy.mil/navydata/cno/n87/usw/usw_summer_09/nautilus.html

Believed to be the most direct course, the intended route (to take Nautilus north through the Bering Strait, west around the Siberian side of St. Lawrence Island, and then into the Chukchi Sea, a shallow, 400-mile expanse) would ultimately deliver the boat to the Arctic Basin. However, in early June the ice was far too hazardous for Nautilus to successfully navigate. At times, there were only 45 feet of water below and 25 feet above Nautilus. Nautilus passed under a huge floe that was 30 feet below the surface.25

Capt. Anderson’s dilemma was a difficult one: if Nautilus encountered thicker ice, she wouldn’t make the passage. The captain arrived at the decision to keep his crew and boat safe for another journey by turning south and eastward, in the direction of the Alaskan side of St. Lawrence Island. Careful threading through the Strait, in waters so shallow that she could only go around rather than under ice, allowed Nautilus to safely enter the Chukchi Sea. Nautilus met a mile-long ice floe that projected more than 60 feet below the surface in the Chukchi Sea. Nautilus cleared it by a mere 5 feet while moving at a crawl. Anderson recalled in Nautilus 90 North, “I waited for, and honestly expected, the shudder and jar of steel against solid ice.” Capt. Anderson realized that this initial effort had failed and the only way home was south.

[Werther]

OK so the IJIS report shows extent is stalling... no rapture, no record, I’m in good company, it seems.
So what’s happening? E to N winds on the Beaufort Sea next days, action shifting to the Laptev and Kara Seas. But to have an effect on extent takes a while. In theory, given low volume, that reaction time shouldn’t take long. Even today can bring high losses around the already large ice free parts in front of the Lena and Ob/Yenisei mouths.
But the difference compared to 2010 is consistently low temperature around the Baffin Bay. The Greenland icesheet is well protected this spring. And so we see how AGW presents itself in a diffuse, matrix-like form. Specific predictions are hard to make. Over at Tamino’s is a good post on CH4. That reflects the general trend, no protection there...
To close this entry, why are we so eager to follow Arctic sea ice. IMO because great loss in volume/area/extent will have tremendous influence on NH/global weather patterns. Read FI Wayne Davidson’s posts. I hardly grasp his use of ‘cloud seeds’ and relations he comes up with (cold high troposphere – ENSO, but his holistic approach seems to fit. Effects here will start earlier and be costly, way before those the demise of the large icesheets will produce.

[Neven]

Yup, that 11 million mark won't be reached this May. Unless extent decreases daily by 75K which hasn't happened before (around this time of year), and won't happen because of the shift in weather patterns. But it was fun, as long as it lasted.

To close this entry, why are we so eager to follow Arctic sea ice. IMO because great loss in volume/area/extent will have tremendous influence on NH/global weather patterns.

That sums it up for me. In fact I'm copying this to another thread.

[Artful Dodger]

Werther wrote: "no rapture, no record"

Don't be too sure Werther! The IJIS end-of-May record minimum is 11,086,250 km^2 set in 2010, not some Psychological milestone ;^)

(Subject to the May 28 SIE update) SIE would need to average roughly -54K/day... The average over the last 10 days is -57,109 km^2 so it will be close.

[HenkL]

It is interesting to keep an eye on the data from the Russian floating Arctic station NP38 (around 81N 174W):
http://www.aari.ru/resources/d0014/np38/

Today the maximum was -1.8°C, at Tuesday it was +2.6°C.

[Gas Glo]

>"that 11 million mark won't be reached this May."

There is always area: On CT, 2010 area reached a record low of 9.99M on 31 May. Currently at 10.01 for 28th, so we are nearly 3 days ahead of the previous record.

[Artful Dodger]

4 days to go, Gas Glo:
10,010,881 km^2 is for May 27, 2011

[Neven]

Yes, SIA is still going down pretty fast with almost a century break reported for the 27th. Combined with lower SIE decreases, this is also having an effect on CAPIE.

[Gas Glo]

Do'h yes, and to complete the correction 9.99M was 30 May 2010 so the nearly 3 days ahead is correct.

[Wayne Kernochan]

Werther:

Sorry, I only get to check in on this thread very occasionally. I had actually been thinking of the "bankable store" as mostly heat stored in top-layer water temp from the sunshine and above-freezing temps of summer. The idea of a bankable store in ice is way above my pay grade. I'd love an explanation, in your copious free time :) - w

[Neven]

Is it me or does the ice plug in Nares look weird?

[dorlomin]

It has changed from a classic arch shape in the past four days or so.

[Warzypants]

I was thinking that was just an overlapping cloud ... but it did have be going for a minute. I'm sure we shall all see very soon.

[logicman]

I've been waiting for a decent ASAR image since that lobe formed. I'm still waiting. :-(
I suggest that a lobe of meltwater flowing off the edge of the ice plug was warm enough to float on top of the more saline layers. The wind was not strong enough to force mixing, but has been cold enough to freeze the surface layer of fresh water. I take this growth in extent to be a sign of local warming which has melted snow cover and ice, which would indicate thinning of the ice plug, so it will not last much longer.
But! I have been wrong twice this year about that darned ice bridge. Maybe you should all bet on it lasting until August. ;-)

[dorlomin]

The weather up near Churchill Manitoba is due to get near 20 during the week, will we see fire works in Hudson?

Also lots of warm air in European Russia near their north coast, sea ice reductions are begining to take off there as well.

[Neven]

Ladies and gentlemen, I'll be going on a two week holiday as of today. I apologize in advance for not covering 'Nares Bridge falling down' (that was the title I had in mind, but the darn plug won't budge) and not doing any SIE update for the coming two weeks.

I'm counting on you to keep the blog alive! ;-)

ps Lodger, I sent you an e-mail...

[dorlomin]

The webcam in Barrow has been stuck for a few days.

[dorlomin]

http://www.earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=50726

Nasa has a short piece of mass loss in the Canadian archapelago.

[Kevin McKinney]

Dorlomin, thanks for a great link. I reposted it on CBC.CA.

[FrankD]

Well I think we can now say 2011 is at new record lows. Todays preliminary reading is 10,970,000 and would need to be revised upwards by a massive 43,000 to go back over 2010.

While we didn't get under 11 mil by the end of May, June 2nd is still the earliest in the IJIS dataset (assuming the revision is under 30K), with June 4th 2006 and 2010 being the previous earliest date below this mark.

Historically, it takes between 15 days (2010) and 22 days (2004) to drop from 11 mil to 10 mil, so I expect we'll be down to 9 something at around the 20th.

[Kevin McKinney]

Sounds reasonable, Frank. This morning (8:35 AM, Eastern time) the revision I'm seeing is only up 150-odd km2 your number, so I think we are indeed under 11M (IJIS SIE) for the season now.

[Gas Glo]

no its 11,002,344

[FrankD]

Facepalm...32000 revision, took us back above 11 mil, but 2011 is still the lowest for now, by a tiny amount ahead of 2010.

So, probably 3rd June. And 2006 and 2010 were also 3rd of June (Day 154), not 4th as I said, so I guess we'll "only" equal that record.

[Andrew Xnn]

Todays temperature anomalies illustrates why temperature by itself does not indicate the rate of melting that may be occurring:

Notice that while the Russian heat wave continues and there is a tongue of anomalously warm air over the central arctic basin, there is also a large area of cool temperatures over northern Canada. I happen to live downwind of that and can vouch that it's cool, dry clear air that we are getting from up north. So, there is a strong flow of air over the arctic and while temperatures over the arctic are not exceptionally high right now, the fact that there is so much air flow means that there is a lot of cold being exported out and that in turn allows for melting of ice and snow.

Also, at long last the Hudson Bay is above normal; so warmer air must be flowing over that area from the south.

[dorlomin]

Looking at the Uni Bremen visualisation it looks like we will be back to melting again soon. At a hunch the slow down may be winds near the Alaska Canada coast reducing the ice free area that had developed.

Newfoundland sea area is looking particularly like there is a great deal about to happen.

[Gas Glo]

Has anyone mentioned NSIDC monthly averages for May:

Area 10.34 lowest on record / 2006 10.39 statistical tie

Extent 12.79 third behind 2004 12.58 and 2006 12.62

[Gas Glo]

NSIDC arctic sea ice news update is out

http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/index.html

[Christoffer Ladstein]

I just came across a great link about the Arctic, mostly through Svalbard/Ny-Ålesund lenses. And funny enough the whole clip is from indian television, watch and enjoy the lovely english-indian accent!
http://ibnlive.in.com/shows/30+minutes/156786.html

[Patrice Pustavrh]

NSIDC has released june report:
http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/2011/060611.html

[Werther]

The call for a reviving El Nino is on. What that means for global climate and Arctic sea ice in particular is hard to tell. By convection , evaporation and spread of cloud seeds, the Arctic may get some protection through july and august.
But the same mechanics set the stage for more turbulence. Not only in the mid-latitudes, producing severe weather during northern hemisphere summer, but also around the Arctic basin.
Because the ice layer is thin, protection against the sun may be equalised by turbulent warm waters.
The second part of 2011 looks bound to present us with more surprises. Maybe not the ‘deeper blow’ to extent, but Neven’s claim for ‘never a dull moment’ looks more appropriate then ever.

[dorlomin]

East Siberias turn to turn on the fire works it seems.

[Artful Dodger]

Serious melt ponds today in the fjord at Kimmirut, Nunavut:
http://www.kimmirutweather.com/

[Peter Ellis]

2011 seems to be following 2010 extent closely at the moment. June SEARCH outlook has just been released.

http://www.arcus.org/search/seaiceoutlook/2011/june

Vast majority of predictions are for worse than last year. Latest PIOMAS prediction (Zhang et al) is for 4.1 million, and they were pretty much on the nail last time. The PIOMAS website hasn't been updated yet, so it's still showing their May prediction of 4.5 million - I presume that will change shortly.

The only ones to predict significant improvement on 2010 are the Wattsupwiththat survey (!) and some other modelling group (Kauker et al). The latter group's model actually predicts just under 5 million, but they jack it up by 0.49 million because their model under-predicts the known minima for 2007/8/9.

[Lord Soth]

The two highest outlooks should be discounted, as they are public outlooks by climate change denialists.

Their is good odds that we may beat the 2007 record for ice loss this year.

[Peter Ellis]

Yeah, I completely overlooked that random upper outlier from the Egan fellow (who?). I notice Steven Goddard's not sticking his neck out this year. The only real prediction for > 2010 is the Kauker modelling effort.

[Gas Glo]

>"good odds that we may beat the 2007 record for ice loss this year."

Does that mean you think 4/17 is good odds or that you think the estimates are too high.

Intrade has quite substantial volume and has 46-48 trading range (read as % chance of 2011 having more ice than 2007 record low so a record is slighlty more likely than not).

Wonder if those intrade odds will adjust more towards 13/17 = 76 ?

Or if the general feeling is that there is good chance of a record and the scientists are wrongly predicting values that are too high.

[Kevin McKinney]

It's the first point I've felt inclined to even guess--and my guess would be that 2011 will bottom out between the 2008 and 2007 levels, missing the record for another year.

But looking back at the curves for 2007 and 2010 really dramatizes how chancy the ultimate minimum number really is. Any given year, as we know, is really more about the weather than the climate--unlike the multi-year trend.

Unfortunately--the latter has a strong air of inevitability about it at this point.

[Lord Soth]

Going with the 17 results, (dropping the two highest, which was a opinion poll, amonst the denialists) we get an average of 4.58 million sq km.

That is within 300,000 of the record and that is in the range of variability of september weather patterns alone.

Off the top of my head, I say we have a 30% chance of beating 2007 for ice loss.

However, if we get the same conditions as 2007 this summer, then we could end up below 4 million sq km.

Things will become more clear as the summer progress. Back in 2007 we knew in early August, that the old record was doomed.

2010 was heading for a record, however in late June, the Beaufort Gyre reversed, and July was cloudy and cool, but despite this, 2010 came close to matching 2nd place.

Regardless, its the volume that counts, and the ice extent is a side show. 2010 had the lowest ice volume, and 2011 will probably be lower.

[Werther]

Routinely checking MODIS, it seems the Nares ice bridge is finally on the move.
A crack has appeared 35 km to the north, spanning the width of the Strait. It has run largely along the freeze up contours, thus still holding on to the strong arch like form.

[Jon Torrance]

For whatever interest it holds, the Beitsch et al prediction comes out of a methodology rather like what Will Crump persistently advocates, here and elsewhere, though with a larger area than just the Arctic Basin as defined by Cryosphere Today. In their words, their analysis is based on "a space-domain selection that neglects the outer seasonal ice zones". It's not clear from their description just how much effort they put into testing different space-domain selections to maximise the predictive skill of their model. Based on their +/- 1.7 million square kms, it would seem they don't think their methodology is very good based on May data, but apparently they think it becomes significantly more reliable by mid-June. We'll have to wait and see what the +/- on their prediction is come the July SEARCH.

[Patrice Pustavrh]

Well, I've checked dr. Zhang's web page for PIOMAS based outlook. It is still for May and it is at 4.5 km2, see:
http://psc.apl.washington.edu/zhang/IDAO/seasonal_outlook.html

According to SEARCH, it looks like dr. Zhang has updated his outlook to 4.1 km2.

Another interesting point: Tamino's prediction from last year was 4.6 km2, which is close to average of all predictions (if we put out two unserious public made predictions out).

[Patrice Pustavrh]

And after checking Nares strait on MODIS, it looks that something begin to happen on southern ice bridge:
http://rapidfire.sci.gsfc.nasa.gov/subsets/?subset=Arctic_r03c02.2011160.terra.250m

Also, bridge in McClure strait has begun to break up:
http://rapidfire.sci.gsfc.nasa.gov/subsets/?subset=Arctic_r04c02.2011160.terra

[Werther]

Yesterday I’ve been doing some CAD-aided counting of floes and leads in a region 400 km north of Cape Morris Jessup. That region has shown severe cracks already during wintertime. As preliminary hunch, I think focusing on extent doesn’t give us a right clue on what is going on. The situation may be far worse than the reassuring deep pinks on the CT map suggest.
On a square 300x300 km2 only 35% of the area consists of more or less unified floes larger than 4x4 km. I guess that would also be the ice TOPAZ/PIPS puts on the maps as 2-3 m thick (those floes resist the longest being cracked). They would stand for 85 km³ in volume.
The other 65% consists of broken floes smaller than 4x4 km and ice rubble in broad, moving leads. The pattern is that of stretch/mesh metal. I haven’t counted the open water between that rubble (I’m not a monk…) but I feel safe to assume that would be some 10% of the lead area.
I assume the rubble in the leads to be already degraded by bottom melt and mechanical damage. The thickness is probably no more than what the Wegener flight reported a couple of weeks ago on their Barrow – Resolute flight; 1.4 m.
Some rough calculation (quoting Logicman ‘ You should see my math…’) derives 150 km³ for that area. The central basin over 80 degrees N holds some 2.8 million km².
I would say there’s 4500 km³ in the central basin now, 4500 km³ has already melted out on the fringes (Bering,Okhotsk, Kara), for the remainder I’d suggest 10.000 km³ (all of the surrounding seas, Baffin, Hudson, Archipelago).
Let’s say the Basin holds out to august. But not at the 4500 km³ it holds now. I see a justification here that there will be only 3200 km³ left, and that isn’t even very dependent on weather. Weather will mainly affect spread, extent.
How much extent would you predict out of 3500 km³? There’s going to be an area record no matter what (IMO, hope I’m wrong).

[Werther]

Sorry, a typo in the last sentence; 3500 should be 3200.
I forgot to mention the flaws in my 'method'
(I often tend to be idle); there was some 15% light cloud cover and I should doublecheck my 'scaling' of the MODIS photo.

[Artful Dodger]

Werther: Which MODIS row/column are you studying? And for which date? I can provide some assistance as I developed a method for estimating Sea Ice Concentration using a Histogram function. Let me know and I'll post the analysis here.

--
Cheers,
Lodger

[Werther]

Santé Lodger,
I'll try to fabric some reproducable graphs tonight or tomorrow. Right now I can point at a part on the right side of
Arctic_r03c03.2011160.terra.
Like I blogged a couple of weeks ago, I'm sure there is a combined method to derive a volume indication out of MODIS, area, extent(CAPIE)and speed/direction of change in the pack.

[idunno]

Hi all,

If WUWT readers have submitted an estimate of the September minimum, maybe we could conduct or own poll amongst contributors here?

In fact, maybe we have (almost) already done so, via the box in the right margin...

Neven, when you get back, this might be a good moment to consider releasing the results so far.

I personally believe that the sea ice is in a condition of rapid decline, and that two scenarios which are not covered by the SEARCH predictions are now possible:

1. One year, possibly this year, the whole Arctic ice sheet will melt away entirely. So much warm water will arrive in the Arctic that the remaining fragmented ice pack will be totalled;

2. The decline in Arctic sea ice will become increasingly apparent not by a further decline in the minimum in September, but by a failure of the open sea to ice over in October, November and December.

In the second of these scenarios, there is a massive exchange of heat between the open sea and the Arctic winter atmosphere, which actually may help reduce the ocean heat content and thus to preserve more of the actual sea ice for longer. But there would likely be extremely grave consequences for the atmosphere and weather patterns of the Northern Hemisphere.

[FrankD]

Last year, I compared PIOMAS volume with CT area. Effectively, the minimum thickness by this measure is about 1.1 m (average thickness of the whole pack). This seems to be a floor value - if the pack thins any more, a large area of ice is lost from the margins and the average thickness is maintained. It can push a little lower, but not much, apparently.

Over the last five years, the most notable change has been the increase in the number of months pushing down to this minimum, from a couple of months in 2003 to about 7 or 8 months now. If we lose more old thick ice as we have over the last few years, all months will be sitting at this "minimum" thickness, and volume and area will advance and recede in lockstep.

On this measure, Werther's figure of 3200 km^3 translates to a Cryosphere Today area of a little under 2.9 M km^2.

I've also been updating my version of a concentration number - IJIS Area / IJIS Extent. At this time of year, concentration is dropping from a little above 90% to a little below. The lowest year of the last 9 for Apr-May-Jun is 2010, consistently 1% to 1.5% below 2006. 2011 is slotting in between the two, between 0.5% and 1% above 2010. However in the last few days concentration has been dropping rapidly and 2011 has now passed 2010 and is the lowest on record for this date at 88.4%, beating 2010's 88.7%. At this time of year, concentration starts dropping by 0.2% - 0.3% per day.

I have only done a little to correlate this number with changes in extent values, but it seems that a drop in concentration forecasts an increase in loss-of-extent. If that holds, it appears that June 2011 is shaping up like June 2007 and June 2010.

[Account Deleted]

Is the blue coloured sea ice in the MODIS image http://rapidfire.sci.gsfc.nasa.gov/subsets/?subset=Arctic_r06c04.2011161.terra

Is this very thin ice that is about to go, water on the ice or due to a loss of snow cover? Or none of the above.

Sorry about my ignorance, but we don't get much sea ice in Borneo.

[FrankD]

http://sailwx.info/shiptrack/shipposition.phtml?call=47557

The buoy on Petermann Ice Island seems to have given up the ghost. Hasn't logged a position in 8 days. :-(

http://rapidfire.sci.gsfc.nasa.gov/realtime/single.php?A111611700

PII is still clearly visible on MODIS pix though. Still moving down the coast of Labrador, although very slowly; since its last reported position on sailwx, its only moved about 1/2 a degree further south.

[Mike]

Colin, I'm going to stick my neck out on the blue ice and say that I yhink this is thin landfast ice without snow cover. I had the thought that it might be freshwater ice, but this does not seem compatible with a lack of snow cover unless precipitation is seasonal, which I doubt.

Frank, I've been following the little island too, thanks for the update.

MikeAinOz

[Werther]

Morning all
Trying my skills on producing a picture of my CAD work...

[Werther]

Well... that's not exactly what I had in mind.
But a lead to photobucket is there when you clic on it.
Lodger, would you verify using your 'histogram function'? Since you repeatedly fixed our attention on the region north of Morris Jessup, it would be great to see if it's possible to get a hold on what's going on there with the (humble?)means we as a group have.

[Artful Dodger]

Werther, the 278x278 pixel coloured insert in the photobucket image above is about 58.6% magenta, and the remainder is various shades of cyan/blue/grey. Hope this helps your analysis!

[Lord Soth]

Here is the Canadian Ice Service latest report on the Petermann Ice Island.

http://www.ec.gc.ca/glaces-ice/default.asp?lang=En&n=D32C361E-1&wsdoc=082CD667-6A9B-4205-AE25-A12B00D4E32B

You can also follow the progress on the Canadian Ice Chart of the Labrador Coast at

http://ice-glaces.ec.gc.ca/prods/WIS26CT/20110610180000_WIS26CT_0005848678.gif

THe largest chunk is the northern hatched pill at aprox 56N 58W

[Andrew Xnn]

Noticed a recent shift in polar temperature anomalies.
Russian coast is mostly below average with exception of far east. Hudson Bay continues at or below average as is Beaufort sea. However, Canadian Arch and Northern Greenland are now above average.

This all indicates a shifting of weather patterns. Not sure what implications might be for melting.

[Werther]

Due to high pressure on sea level, winds have pushed out the floes in the check region north of Greenland. A clockwise rotation has opened up a lead 250 km long and up to 10 km wide on the NE side of Greenland. Showing how mobile the pack is; in 48 hours the floes have moved up to 9 km. Moreover, they have cracked to smaller parts.
Lodger, the magenta 58% on the drawing is rubble in leads between remaining floes. Now that cloud cover over the area has completely faded, it is clear how fractured the pack is. Even compared to day 162, 2010. It moves with every surface wind. The winds have grip. Idunno’s suggestion isn’t way out; open sea could spread easily right up to the north pole and/or Ellesmere in the coming months.

[FrankD]

I don't know the answer to Colin Maycock's question about blue ice, but I'm curious myself. Does anyone know causes it? Because it seems to be appearing ever-more widely.

Ice that's so thin that light penetrates to the sea below, yet in such sheltered water that it doesn't get churned by wind and wave into a slushie?

I've only been watching ice this closely for a bit over a year, but I've not seen anything like this, IIRC.

[Andrew Xnn]

Wikipedia has an entry on Blue Ice:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_ice_(glacial)

Suspect that the areas in the MODIS image are dry almost permanently frozen where air bubbles have been squeezed out allowing the ice to become partially blue.

[Mike]

I think the blue ice merits more investigation, good on you Colin for asking such an interesting question! Lodger has got me interested in what's happening north of Greenland. I looked in MODIS and was reminded of a well known rice cereal floating in milk. Then I thought it would float around so I looked at Cryosphere Today and the saw that the Greenland Sea anomaly has trended upwards. I reckon the mushy mass is on the move.

[FrankD]

Thanks Andrew, but I don't think its glacial ice. The areas where it is appearing are definitely not permanently frozen, but rather very seasonal areas.

I had a look back to last year, and found there was quite a bit then (esp ~day 170) that I didn't notice - I put it down to my old monitor washing out pale colours unlike the current one - certainly not a lack of attention on my part, dear me, no... ;-P

Skimming at intervals through last year, it's not obviously connected with immanent melting - E.Siberian and Laptev turned quite blue before fragmenting, but NWP turned blue, then went back to white before it fragmented last year.

Perhaps its just an atmospheric effect. Different days seem to be have widely seperated areas shifting bluer or whiter in synch, which suggests its an image processing artifact.

[Peter Ellis]

Pretty sure it relates to melt ponds on the surface of the ice, which can be very blue.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Sea_Ice_MeltPonds.png

If the meltwater runs off without pooling, you can get breakup without seeing any "blue" stage. If it pools, but the pools drain by percolation, it'll go blue, then back to white before it breaks up.

[Peter Ellis]

http://www.nationalgeographicstock.com/comp/AS/001/1176154.jpg

[Janne Tuukkanen]

Lurker awakes...

I've got somewhere photo of nearby waterfall winter two years ago, when half of the fall had frozen in spectacularly blue (or cyan) color. Last year in Norway, we crossed glacier edge, and there was a point, where snow had melted, had made a stream and refrozen into bright blue stripe which run down to the glacier itself. (Slippery as **ll and long slide down had I fell. Galdhöpiggen from Spiterstulen, FYI)

The color has to be related to oxygen concentration and/or crystal structure of the ice.

[Andrew Xnn]

Ice without air in it can appear blue; more so under some lighting conditions than others.

[idunno]

Hi all,

Regarding the apparent thinning of the ice in the Fram Strait, area around Cap Maris Jessup and on up to the North Pole...

First, I have found a very good source of satellite images, which is new to me, at:

http://www.arctic.io/observations.

There is beautifully clear shot of the area on 11 June.

Also found very interesting a recent paper, called something like...

"High recent Fram Strait sea ice export" by LH Smedsrud et al

In one line, sea ice export via the Fram Strait has increased by 25% since the 1960s, due to an increase in wind, not current.

From the above, and for reasons previously stated, I think the Fram Strait sector of the Arctic Basin may be very understrength in ice and in some danger of a spectacular collapse this year.

Time will tell, but I see it as a possibility.

(On a personal note, as I post here quite a lot, and in other places frequented by other regulars here, could I just note that I am not the only "idunno" posting on the internet. Specifically, the Guardian's "idunno" is not me.)

[Janne Tuukkanen]

Just wondering... Oxygen scatters blue wavelengths, right? So shouldn't bluishness indicate _more_ oxygen (air)? Most of times of course the blue color of water body or snow is simply reflection of the sky above.

As a child, there was a cold pool in nearby swimming hall. Near freezing water, so you could do some ice swimming around a year. And there was strong green tint in that water.

[idunno]

Hi Janne,

If you drop children into ice swimming water, I think it is guaranteed that the water turns green.

This would have less to do with the chemistry of water, more the chemistry of urine.

[Janne Tuukkanen]

Oh no! It was fun. You know how nine years old are. You went through that icy thing (just to show you DARE) and run either into cozy small-children pool, or +90C sauna.

Ok. Maybe Finnish kids have strange ideas about 'fun'.

[r w Langford]

idunno
Thanks for the link. Also found and interesting paper there from Alfred Wegner Institute on ice thickness survey this spring reporting inner arctic ice thickness at 1.4m compared to 1.6m in 2010 and 1.7m in 2009. This ice is not expected to survive the summer. Interesting to note that ice will soon be properly denoted in months not years. now.http://www.awi.de/en/news/press_releases/detail/item/polar_5_uebersetzung_noch_einfuegen/?cHash=b471e839cdf6e2fbd33167c8a94c4b1b