Arktis havis afsmeltning 2010

Climate change is transforming the Arctic environment faster than expected and accelerating the disappearance of sea ice, scientists said on Friday in giving their early findings from the biggest-ever study of Canada's changing north.

Sea ice extent increased at a fairly steady rate in the early part of the month and then slowed towards the end of January. A brief slowdown in ice growth is not unusual during winter.

Andre gode links??

All of the action is in the Bering Sea. For the past several weeks, we've been under a rather unusual weather pattern, a cold pattern, that's given us this late spurt in ice growth in the Bering Sea. If you look at the rest of the Arctic Ocean proper, it is very warm.

Everyone's on this now....What you're seeing now from the usual suspects is that it's the end of global warming, and we don't see it that way.

Once the winds change, temperatures change, we'll probably lose it pretty quickly.

Arctic sea ice reached its maximum extent for the year on March 31 at 15.25 million square kilometers (5.89 million square miles). This was the latest date for the maximum Arctic sea ice extent since the start of the satellite record in 1979.

Mark Serreze of the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colo., which publishes daily sea-ice updates on its website:

Of course we know that NSIDC director Mark Serreze is very active with the press. Perhaps some of our media friends reading this should seek out someone at NANSEN for the next sea ice story so that there's some balance.
The differences in the way each organization presents their data and views to the public might explain the differences in the way the output is calculated. One might take a "glass half full" approach while the other takes a "glass half empty" approach. Or it may have a basis in science that I'm not privy to yet. The point is that there are significant differences in the public presentation of sea ice data between the two organizations. One showed sea ice extent as normal, the other took sharp right turn just before it was expected to happen.
I welcome input from both of these organizations to explain the difference.

Arctic sea ice is on track to recede to a record low this year, suggesting that northern waters free of summer ice are coming faster than anyone thought.

The latest satellite data show ice coverage is equal to what it was in 2007, the lowest year on record, and is declining faster than it did that year.

"Could we break another record this year? I think it's quite possible," said Mark Serreze of the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colo.

"We are going to lose the summer sea-ice cover. We can't go back."

In April, the centre published data showing that sea ice had almost recovered to the 20-year average. That ignited a flurry of interest on climate change skeptic blogs.

But much of that ice was thin and new. The warmest April on record in the Arctic made short work of it.

Ice cover has already fallen back to where it was in 2007 at this time of year and is disappearing at a faster pace than it did then. Serreze said winds, cloud cover or other weather conditions could slow the melt, but he points out that the decline is likely to speed up even more in June and July.

"Will (thawing) this year be particularly fast?" asked Serreze. "We don't know. We really don't know."

One of Canada's top sea-ice experts suggests things might even be worse than Serreze thinks. His data could be underestimating the collapse of summer ice cover, said David Barber of the University of Manitoba. Researchers can't learn anything from satellite data about the state or thickness of the ice.

"What we think is thick multi-year ice late in the summer is in fact not," he said. "It's heavily decayed first-year ice. When that stuff starts to reform in the fall, we think it's multi-year ice, but it's not."

Arctic explorers and scientific expeditions are finding more open water and untrustworthy ice ever, said Barber.

He pointed out the Arctic continued to lose multi-year ice even in 2008 and 2009, when total ice coverage rebounded somewhat.

True multi-year ice — the thick, hard stuff that stops ships — now comprises about 18 per cent of the Arctic ice pack. In 1981, when Barber first went north, that figure was 90 per cent.

"This is all just part of a trajectory moving toward a seasonally ice-free Arctic," he said. "That's happening more quickly than we thought it would happen."

Once northern waters are clear in the summer, there will be little difference between navigating the Northwest Passage and the Gulf of St. Lawrence, Barber suggested.

He recounts sailing through degraded ice in an icebreaker. The ship's top speed in open water was 13.7 knots. Its speed through the decayed ice was 13 knots.

"It was almost like it didn't exist."

In May, Arctic air temperatures remained above average, and sea ice extent declined at a rapid pace. At the end of the month, extent fell near the level recorded in 2006, the lowest in the satellite record for the end of May. Analysis from scientists at the University of Washington suggests that ice volume has continued to decline compared to recent years. However, it is too soon to say whether Arctic ice extent will reach another record low this summer—that will depend on the weather and wind conditions over the next few months.

Ice extent measurements provide a long-term view of the state of Arctic sea ice, but they only show the ice surface. Total ice volume is critical to the complete picture of sea ice decline. Numerous studies indicate that sea ice thickness and volume have declined along with ice extent....

Siden slutningen af juni er tabet af Arktisk havis dog bremset voldsomt op.

Her tre uger inde i juli har vi en ca. 6% større isudbredelse end på samme tidspunkt i 2007, fortæller seniorforsker ved Center for Ocean og Is på DMI Gorm Dybkjær.
"Afsmeltningen er bremset hårdt op. Det arktiske isdække svandt i de første par uger af juli i år kun med ca. 60.000 kvadratkilometer per dag"

rick_uk skrev:
Hmm..Hvor ligger nordvestpassagen?

The Canadian Arpichelago.

Hvordan stå det til lige der?

Current Canadian Archipelago Sea Ice Area

Lidt mangler der i glasset.

Hvad siger du, Kosmose. Åbner NVpassagen i år?

Eller ej??