The PIOMAS graphs at the Polar Science Center of the Applied Physics Laboratory at the University of Washington have been updated. Here is the current modeled volume:
And the volume anomaly:
Commenter graphs
As always Wipneus was quick to update his graphs. Here is his graph showing all the trends in the period 2002-2011:
Interesting that both this year and last, there was a anomalous dip in the measurement around June.
Could it be that melt ponds are more common than in the past and thus throwing off the thickness measurements?
So, rather than then -10 (1000km3), the actual anomaly is perhaps closer to -7 or 8 (1000km3).
Posted by: Andrew Xnn | August 04, 2011 at 01:39
If you have a very steep drop in volume, which happens at a slightly earlier date, the difference between this year and last year would have the appearance shown in the difference graph, and would as seen last year nearly disappear near the bottom of the summer. To first order the difference curve would be (dV/dt) Delta-t where V is the volume, dV/dt is the local slope of the volume vs time, and Delta-t is the displacement in the start of melting sideways on the melting curve.
Posted by: George Phillies | August 04, 2011 at 14:30
Hi Neven,
One of the more interesting predictions for September minimum sea ice extent (SIE) comes from the Polar Science Center at U-Wash. On July 1st, 2011 a PIOMAS model run predicted the evolution of arctic sea ice every 3 days through to the end of September, 2011.
Since the PIOMAS is arguably the most sophisticated model for sea ice, it would be interesting to see how the model forecast from 43 days ago matches up with AMSR-E observations. So let's compare data for August 12, 2011.
Here's the animation:
A short summary of observations follows:
Overall, remarkable performance from PIOMAS, correctly predicting the overall pattern of progress for Arctic sea ice melt, Summer 2011 Edition.
Cheers,
Lodger
Posted by: Artful Dodger | August 13, 2011 at 17:06