2013's Summer Arctic Sea Ice
By Becky Oskin, Staff Writer 42 minutes ago
A satellite image of Arctic sea ice snapped on Sept. 12, 2013.
It's official: The Arctic icepack reached its summer low on Sept. 13, the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) in Boulder, Colo., said today (Sept. 20).
The Arctic ice cover melted down to 1.97 million square miles (5.10 million square kilometers) — about the size of Texas and California combined.
The final tally puts 2013 in sixth place out of the top 10 record low ice years since tracking began with satellites 30 years ago. It also continues an overall downward trend in the extent of summer sea ice, the NSIDC said. (2012 is the top record holder, with the lowest summer ice extent ever recorded.)
The rebound in ice cover after a record low year was expected, Walt Meier, a glaciologist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., said in a statement. "There is always a tendency to have an uptick after an extreme low; in our satellite data, the Arctic sea ice has never set record low minimums in consecutive years. [Video: Watch the 2013 summer ice melt]
Colder-than-average temperatures and stormy weather helped the ice stick around this year. Summer cyclones spread the ice over a large area, NASA said in a statement. Clouds blocked the sun, and the cool air kept the Northwest Passage frozen shut for the first time since 2007. The ice edge was several hundred miles farther south than last year near Alaska and Siberia in the Beaufort, Chukchi and East Siberian sea regions.
Though there is more ice this year than in 2012, the ice is much thinnerthan in previous decades, Meier said. Instead of thick, multiyear ice that survives through multiple melt and freeze cycles, most of the icepack is thinner first-year ice.
"This year, the cool temperatures saved more of the ice. However, the fact that as much of the ice melted as it did is an indication of how much the ice cover had changed," Meier said.
Email Becky Oskin or follow her @beckyoskin. Follow us @livescience, Facebook & Google+. Original article on LiveScience.co
Mick,
ReplyDeleteYou would believe that the sky is orange if some scientist on the government climate change dole told you so.
Seriously, every scientific journal paper that is published has been reviewed by scientists working in the same field. Those reviewers would like nothing better than to shoot you down, since you are their competition. Believe me, I have been there. I can think of n better system to guarantee scientific accuracy (and honesty).
ReplyDeleteIt's 6th of the worst 10 of 30?
ReplyDeleteSorry, the sampling is shit. No good conclusion can be drawn by this.
I'm a little skeptical if the database extends only 30 years. Perhaps better to say it isn't convincing yet, yes?
ReplyDeleteJean
And there will be another excuse next year, when the ice cover rebounds even more.
ReplyDeleteThe money is speaking! This issue became very politicized at some point. The Earth heats, the Earth cools and it may or may not be caused by our pollution. The glaring point here is that we can't deny that we are producing pollution to have the conveniences of a modern lifestyle. I'm not prepared to go back to a horse and buggy or pay more taxes than I already do for the energy I consume. I also don't understand why people buy into the big petroleum or big coal arguments that coming up with alternative energy is stupid. I can hardly wait until we have fusion reactors producing electricity which will drive much more efficient engines than the internal combustion engines we have today.
ReplyDeleteGlobal warming and cooling has been around for centuries, it wasn't until the satellite era that widespread data could be created. 30 years of data for a planet of this age is ridiculous, 100 years of data would still be ridiculous, however high value government taxpayer paid for studies need to be handed out to the cronies in order to create a climate (good choice of words, eh) crisis so that the money will come forth to change the earths climate for the better, global cooling... Think about it, global cooling, dead crops, less farm land, countries high and low down on the globe wiped out, frozen off a world suffering from global cooling. Global Warming is a cause celeb, a fight to make us pay more at the pump to keep the gas and oil cleaner, a fight to shut down coal plants, well God forbid these nut jobs continue to get there way, a warmer globe will still grow food, a cooler globe will wipe out folks from starvation. Cows will die, pigs, major food sources dwindle.
ReplyDeleteBe careful what you ask for.