Sea Ice Extent for 2013

[Lauren Johnson]

Although I have posted that the volume of polar ice is the big number, and that the extent is a much more volatile number, here is the 2013 update. In short, up from last year but still well within the trend of the latest decades.

On September 13, Arctic sea ice reached its likely minimum extent for 2013. The minimum ice extent was the sixthlowest* in the satellite record, and reinforces the long-term downward trend in Arctic ice extent. Sea ice extent will now begin its seasonal increase through autumn and winter. Meanwhile, in the Antarctic, sea ice extent reached a record high on September 18, tied with last year's maximum.Please note that this is a preliminary announcement. Changing winds could still push ice floes together, reducing ice extent further. NSIDC scientists will release a full analysis of the melt season in early October, once monthly data are available for September.
[B]Overview of conditions[/B]

Figure 1. Arctic sea ice extent for September 13, 2013 was 5.10 million square kilometers (1.97 million square miles). The orange line shows the 1981 to 2010 median extent for that day. The black cross indicates the geographic North Pole. Sea Ice Index data. About the data

Credit: National Snow and Ice Data Center
High-resolution image

On September 13, 2013, sea ice extent dropped to 5.10 million square kilometers (1.97 million square miles). This appears to have been the lowest extent of the year. In response to the setting sun and falling temperatures, ice extent will now climb through autumn and winter. However, a shift in wind patterns or a period of late season melt could still push the ice extent lower. The minimum extent was reached two days earlier than the 1981 to 2010 average minimum date of September 15.
[B]Conditions in context[/B]

Figure 2. The graph above shows Arctic sea ice extent as of September 19, 2013, along with daily ice extent data for five previous years. 2013 is shown in blue, 2012 in green, 2011 in orange, 2010 in pink, 2009 in navy, and 2008 in purple. The 1981 to 2010 average is in dark gray. Sea Ice Index data.

Credit: National Snow and Ice Data Center
High-resolution image

This year's minimum was 1.69 million square kilometers (653,000 square miles) above the record minimum extent in the satellite era, which occurred on September 16, 2012, and 1.12 million square kilometers (432,000 square miles) below the 1981 to 2010 average minimum.
Varying distribution of ice in 2013 versus 2012

Figure 3. This image compares differences in ice-covered areas between September 13, 2013, the date of this year's minimum, and September 16, 2012, the record low minimum extent. Light gray shading indicates the region where ice occurred in both 2013 and 2012, while white and dark gray areas show ice cover unique to 2013 and to 2012, respectively. Sea Ice Index data. About the data

Credit: National Snow and Ice Data Center
High-resolution image

Comparing this year's minimum extent to 2012, while extent was higher on average this year, there were variations from region to region. There was considerably higher sea ice extent in the Beaufort, Chukchi, and East Siberian sea regions, with the ice edge several hundred kilometers farther south compared to last year. This year the Canadian Archipelago also retained much more ice, keeping the Northwest Passage closed. The most notable area of less ice this year compared to last was off the east coast of Greenland, south of Fram Strait. Other small areas of decreased extent were found north of the Kara and Laptev seas.
See an animation of this summer's sea ice extent produced by the NASA Scientific Visualization Studio at http://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/goto?4104.
Previous minimum Arctic sea ice extents**

[TABLE="width: 0"]
[TR]
[TH] YEAR[/TH]
[TH="bgcolor: #F6F6F6, colspan: 2"]MINIMUM ICE EXTENT[/TH]
[TH="width: 110, bgcolor: #F6F6F6"]DATE[/TH]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TH="width: 196, bgcolor: #F6F6F6"]IN MILLIONS OF SQUARE KILOMETERS[/TH]
[TH="width: 221, bgcolor: #F6F6F6"]IN MILLIONS OF SQUARE MILES[/TH]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]2007[/TD]
[TD]4.17[/TD]
[TD]1.61[/TD]
[TD]September 18[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]2008[/TD]
[TD]4.59[/TD]
[TD]1.77[/TD]
[TD]September 20[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]2009[/TD]
[TD]5.13[/TD]
[TD]1.98[/TD]
[TD]September 13[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]2010[/TD]
[TD]4.63[/TD]
[TD]1.79[/TD]
[TD]September 21[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]2011[/TD]
[TD]4.33[/TD]
[TD]1.67[/TD]
[TD]September 11[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]2012[/TD]
[TD]3.41[/TD]
[TD]1.32[/TD]
[TD]September 16[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]2013[/TD]
[TD]5.10[/TD]
[TD]1.97[/TD]
[TD]September 13[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]1979 to 2000 average[/TD]
[TD]6.70[/TD]
[TD]2.59[/TD]
[TD]September 13[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]1981 to 2010 average[/TD]
[TD]6.22[/TD]
[TD]2.40[/TD]
[TD]September 15[/TD]
[/TR]
[/TABLE]

* According to near-real-time data, this year's minimum extent is slightly lower than 2009. However, the ranking between 2009 and 2013 is close, and may change once the final version of the data are processed. See our Frequently Asked Questions: Do your data undergo quality control? for more information about near-real-time data.
** Note that the dates and extents of the minimums have been re-calculated from what we posted in previous years; see our Frequently Asked Questions for more information.

This post comes from Arctic Sea Ice News and Analysis blog.

http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/2013/0...-for-2013/

[Charlie Prima]

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[Lauren Johnson]

The ice decided to retire and move south.

This year Antarctica experienced a record-breaking increase in sea ice.

::hush::

[Charlie Prima]

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[Lauren Johnson]

Charlie, I don't know you. If you meant this to be funny, its not. If you're serious, it is beyond ignorant.

I thought it was quite funny.

I'm new to this forum, and thus unaware of your religious quirks.

Perhaps you could endeavor to be less rude and insulting. It would benefit both you and the forum.

Religious quirks? And just how did I reveal my religious quirks? And what are they?

[Peter Lemkin]

To get back to the science and not the attacks, while there is acknowledged by the majority of environmental and climate scientists, worldwide that there is climate warming [and that it is due to changes in several things humans have caused], it is to be expected that the TREND will vary slightly year to year or even in wavering of a few years. It is the trend that is important. The North Polar ice is very drastically lessened in recent years - to the extent that Polar Bears are threatened and new shipping routes have opened up for the first time in memory, along with new polar sea oil rigs being placed, etc. Antarctica is a more complex situation, with ice loss in some areas and in the last two years some ice increase in others...but this doesn't represent any proof of anything. While the Earth overall is warming, in some places temporarily, it will be cooler [while most places, on average, will warm], warmer air and sea also change the conditions everywhere - producing stronger and more storms, greater rain and floods in most areas [a few will experience less rain]. This is my field - Environmental Science - which I studied up to the graduate level and have taught and keep up on. It has always saddened me that some great researchers on other things Deep Political are blind to this - a deep political conspiracy by Big Oil, Big Money, Big Chemical, et al. They can be in denial, but the climate will warm and change for the worse for most humans and most other living things - on land and in the sea and air. We are fouling our own 'bed' - we [humans] are a plague on the Planet unless we reduce our numbers and impact [called a footprint in Environmental Science] on Gaia. No one need or should be harmed or killed to reduce the numbers and Environmental Scientists do not believe in Eugenics or the like...just realizing that any finite resource cannot support infinite use [now becoming abuse!]. Yes, the Koch Bros. have funded a few scientists in secret to produce papers saying that climate change is part of a natural cycle in Earth/Sun...blah, blah....it is not. It is due to increased CO2, methane, other chemicals and aerosols in the atmosphere, cutting of forests and damage to other carbon sinks [absorbers], pollution of all kinds, overuse and/or overhunting of resources - non-living and living. The ways in which we are damaging the Planet and life on it - including ourselves - are many. Warming of the air and seas only one. If denied by a majority [gladly this is not so, at this time] it will mean the end of most life. Technology can NOT do more than provide a temporary patch - and then only for the wealthy. Physics and science, Nature, in the end will rebalance the system, as it must....this new balance will not favor humans nor most living things. We must stop our uncontrolled growth in numbers and use [abuse; overuse] of resources. At the same time, the poor and developing have every right to 'catch up' with the wealthy and developed. It is a very delicate balancing act and THERE technology can help....along with not being in denial about the problem; ultimately greater than the political ones we face, which are more immediate and obvious, but pale next to changing the Earth for the need and greed of one species, temporarily - and even there for a few.....already most humans are beginning to suffer from the double curse of imperialism/wars/financial manipulations/deep-political-shit and environmental destruction. Watch the floods, the stronger storms, droughts, rising sea-level, pollution, habitat destruction, resource exhaustion....and more.....it has been ongoing for some time, but all too obvious since the age of oil and modern technological [over]development. We can still have our computers and such, but must, overall, reduce and change our relationship with our Mother [Earth] and all who live on her....or perish rather sooner than later. The Native Americans [and most other Native People's had it correct - 'civilized' [sic] humans have long had it wrong [their relationship with their environment]. I would suggest people look at the books or lectures by Derrick Jensen and the many other voices calling for immediate change - especially by the most 'developed' peoples to a change toward the views of the Native Peoples who lived for hundreds of thousands of years in harmony with their environment. Below, one of many good films to awaken those still asleep to where we are headed - to the extinction of OUR species and most others......but before that a horrible period of decline, wars, shortages, suffering of the EVER GROWING numbers of poor, RAPID environmental degradation, etc. The film names and interviews most of the better writers, thinkers, speakers on the subject. Change or perish...we haven't long now. ::face.palm:: Nothing short of a total paradigm shift in our mode of thinking about the meaning of life well lived [personal and societal] is needed; our inter-relationship with the living and non-living world that sustain us and won't if we abuse or over-use it/change it into an unsustainable nightmare - these changes; these paradigm shifts, I am sure are paralleled in the Environmental / Social-Philosophical / and Deep Political spheres. The same forces and the same denial - the same allowance of a small group of would-be feudal overlords are destroying our environment; our polity; our philosophy and education - everything. Change your paradigm and the path to rectify all becomes OBVIOUS - then it is just a matter of action. When will you hammer in your picket pin?! [see the film for the context of that remark]. Please watch this film - show it to others. I cry every time I see it...and I have shown it in my environmental courses over 100 times. It touches me. I hope some part of it reaches you. Its message is real in a way - in the exact way - that most of human society [especially the 'advanced' cultures technologically] have become unreal and detached from the real human nature, human philosophy, and Nature itself. Be a part of the solution to all of our problems; not just some of them; and not just a cynical watcher. Act. Feel. Be. Fight. Hammer in your picket pins and stand our ground. Win....and we win the future. Loose and we have lost the Planet for ourselves and future generations - your children and those of others - not to mention the tens of millions of other species who have as much right [or more] to survive than we do. Join those who have decided to force a paradigm shift - first on themselves, then their friends, and then the World of Humans. Join Us.

[Tracy Riddle]

That's a great documentary, Peter. Yes, we are apes whose brains have grown too big for our skulls, and it's made us insane.

[Charlie Prima]

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[Charlie Prima]

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[Magda Hassan]

No posts were deleted. Some posts were moderated as they were either off topic to the subject of this thread or were bordering on ad homs.