Arctic Sea Ice

PIOMAS February 2019

It was a long wait, what with the US government shutdown and a new year requiring spreadsheet updates, but here is the first PIOMAS update of 2019.

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Another month has passed and so here is the updated Arctic sea ice volume graph as calculated by the Pan-Arctic Ice Ocean Modeling and Assimilation System (PIOMAS) at the Polar Science Center:

Good news! So far, the winter has been good for Arctic sea ice. The past three months have been relatively cool, especially when compared to the previous three winters, which broke all temperature records for the Arctic (see Zack Labe's excellent graph here). Of course, PIOMAS has responded in kind. With 3456 km3, January was well above the 3179 km3 average for the 2007-2018 period. And so, 2019 starts out as 7th lowest on record, a whopping 2500 km3 behind ranking leader 2017, almost doubling the gap since the end of November.

Here's how the differences with previous years have evolved from last month:

Wipneus hasn't updated his version of the PIOMAS graph yet, so we move on to the anomaly graph. Here too, it's clear that things are going relatively well for the ice, with the trend line venturing into 2 standard deviation territory:

PIOMAS December 2018

Another month has passed and so here is the updated Arctic sea ice volume graph as calculated by the Pan-Arctic Ice Ocean Modeling and Assimilation System (PIOMAS) at the Polar Science Center:

November has been an excellent month for Arctic sea ice. With 4226 km3, it recorded the highest volume increase for November in the 2007-2018 period, well above the average of 3491 km3. The reasons for this are obvious: rapid growth in ice extent and relatively low temperatures (more on that below). This means that 2018 has dropped from 4th lowest to 6th lowest, and the gap with leader 2016 has grown by a whopping 1322 km3!

Here's how the differences with previous years have evolved from last month:

Because all the trend lines go up fast around this time of year, I'm posting another Wipneus graph that visualises PIOMAS volume anomaly, showing 2018's massive increase more clearly:

PIOMAS November 2018

Another month has passed and so here is the updated Arctic sea ice volume graph as calculated by the Pan-Arctic Ice Ocean Modeling and Assimilation System (PIOMAS) at the Polar Science Center:

October has seen a continuation of the trend that set in right after the September minimum (see last month's update), where 2018 went from 6th lowest at the minimum to 5th lowest at the end of the September, and now it's 4th at the end of October, practically on a par with 2011. The increase of 2115 km3, well below the 2367 km3 average, was actually 3rd lowest in the 2007-2018 record, with only 2007 and 2016 having an even lower increase (1637 and 1648 km3 respectively). That means that 2018 has crept closer to the years below it, and moved away further from the years above it, overtaking 2017 for the first time this year.

Here's how the differences with previous years have evolved from last month:

Wipneus' version of the PIOMAS graph shows how this year's trend line blocks out that of 2011, that's how close together they have been for a couple of weeks now:

PIOMAS October 2018

I was ready to write about this 10 days ago, but the data wasn't out yet. And then life got in the way, as it always does. On the bright side, Wipneus has just updated his PIOMAS graphs to mid-October. More on that below, but first I'll discuss the minimum.

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Another month has passed and so here is the updated Arctic sea ice volume graph as calculated by the Pan-Arctic Ice Ocean Modeling and Assimilation System (PIOMAS) at the Polar Science Center:

As always, the minimum was reached in September. This year, the lowest amount of sea ice volume, according to PIOMAS, was reached on September 15th, and ended up 6th lowest on record, after 2010, 2011, 2012, 2016 and 2017. And thus, because the maximum was second lowest on record, total melt was 9th lowest on record:

If we look at the data for the end of September, 2018 has already crept to 5th lowest on record, almost on a par with 2017. Where most years gain a bit of volume during September, 2018 actually lost 119 km3, thus reducing the gap with all years that were lower at the end of August (dipping below 2010), as can be seen on this table showing how the differences with previous years have evolved from last month:

If we then look at Wipneus' most recent graph with data up to mid-October, we see that 2018 has gone down even further in the ranking and is now in 3rd place:

Freezing season has started, or has it?

We tend to focus on the end of the melting season, also known as the minimum, because that's when the ice covers the least amount of water. That's all fine and dandy, but of course, it's just an arbitrary measuring point. For instance, this year's minimum for the JAXA sea ice extent data set was 6th lowest on record, but flash forward to the first week of October and this year's trend line is third lowest on record and could soon be second lowest on record:

This, as always, had to do with the weather, which has been pretty crazy the past two weeks. First, fierce winds pushed back against the ice edge in most of the Arctic Ocean, delaying the ice pack's expansion, while at the same time continuing to melt that last, stubborn sliver of ice extending towards the East Siberian Sea. The result has been a continuing decline of sea ice extent in the Arctic Basin, and to a lesser extent in the East Siberian Sea, where, normally, the trend line should have been going up already (image courtesy of Wipneus, ASIG Regional graphs):

Another factor that has come into play these past few days, is heat. It's mostly coming from the Pacific, where sea surface temperatures are running quite hot again, as can be seen on these DMI sea surface temperature anomaly maps, comparing this year's start of October with those of 2016 and 2017:

2018 Arctic sea ice minimum

Another great video, this time from NASA Goddard:

 

Hurricane Florence and Arctic sea ice

Yet another destructive hurricane has hit the US, following a highly unusual path, smashing precipitation records all around. Dr Jennifer Francis breaks it down in this excellent video from The Real News Network (please, share):

 

PIOMAS September 2018

I've waited an extra week with this post because I was on a holiday and because the minimum is about to get hit. More on that below, but first a short discussion of the PIOMAS August data.

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Another month has passed and so here is the updated Arctic sea ice volume graph as calculated by the Pan-Arctic Ice Ocean Modeling and Assimilation System (PIOMAS) at the Polar Science Center:

Just like last month, I had expected perhaps a larger drop. But whereas last month the volume loss was still above average, this month's isn't. The 2007-2017 average volume decrease for August is 2578 km3, and this year it was 2347 km3, more than 200 km3 lower. This means that 2018 is back in 6th position again, as the difference with lower years (except last year) has grown again.

Here's how the differences with previous years have evolved from last month:

On Wipneus' version of the PIOMAS graph we can see how the trend line made a slight drop towards the end of the month, veering away from 2013:

Circumnavigating Greenland

A quite spectacular event took place during the past two weeks, and if it had continued for a while longer, I'm sure it would've been reported widely. It's something I've semi-jokingly alluded to when setting up this blog back in 2010, in my third blog post called Dire Straits, and a partial answer to the question commenter fredt34* asked at the time:

The big hole opening in East Greenland re-activated my interest for this question: will we see Greenland being circumnavigable this year? If not, when?

That was July 23rd 2010, and now a little over 8 years later, we have almost seen it happen: a corridor of open water between Fram Strait and the Lincoln Sea (where Nares Strait starts). Here's an animation of NASA EOSDIS Worldview satellite images showing what has happened during the past two weeks, ending yesterday (click for a slightly larger version):

And here's the animation with only the first and last images, two weeks apart:

PIOMAS August 2018

PIOMAS data came in a bit later this month, and I'm a bit later still, but this gives us an opportunity to look at what may happen during the second half of the month.

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Another month has passed and so here is the updated Arctic sea ice volume graph as calculated by the Pan-Arctic Ice Ocean Modeling and Assimilation System (PIOMAS) at the Polar Science Center:

Given the heat on the Siberian side of the Arctic and extensive melting in the Kara and Laptev Seas I had expected a larger drop. Nevertheless, a loss of 6229 km3 of sea ice volume is well above the 2007-2017 average of 6020 km3. This essentially means that 2018 has caught up some more with the years in front of it, and even slipped below 2016 (the difference is a mere 17 km3), which means it's in 5th position as of July 31. The difference with 2012 has been reduced with 610 km3, and is now 907 km3.

Here's how the differences with previous years have evolved from last month: