University Of Bremen AMSR Update For 28 July - Thinning Appears To Be Moving Fairly Quickly

[hatrack]

Especially true if you look at the 10:00 - 12:00 segment of the sea ice - it's thinned pretty substantially in just the last three-four days.

http://www.iup.uni-bremen.de:8084/amsr/arctic_AMSRE_visual_small.jpg

http://www.iup.uni-bremen.de:8084/amsr/arctic_AMSRE_nic_small.jpg

[Dogmudgeon]

1. Gadzooks! Half of the polar ice is turning into polynya!

Look at the graying areas on the top graphic, coded as <100% ice on the bottom graphic. So much broken ice -- so early in the season!

My first thought: this couldn't be from the air temperature alone; there must be a thermohaline-mediated effect failing to remove the heat (little though it may be) in the water, or perhaps moving warmer water in from the ocean bottom north of Russia and Scandinavia.

Then I thought, "I don't have enough knowledge to say, either way. Perhaps an oceanologist would."

Third round: "This is probably an entirely new phenomenon, so the oceanologists would be in the dark, too." Just not as much in the dark as me.

Next thought: is this going to start driving winter weather? My wild-assed guess is that as worming continues, a paradoxically warm area will form in the Arctic that becomes a strong meteorological driver from September to January. A similar effect can be seen with lake-effect blizzards on the eastern edges of the Great Lakes, Lakes Baikal and Manitoba, and probably a number of other northern lakes. In colder times, the Great Lake snows ended by early January when the lakes (especially Lake Erie) froze over, but last year, it was an all-winter thing.

I myself like the snow, but I'd rather have had an episode of 0.2°C global cooling instead. White Christmases, no desertification.

What are your odds for a patent, navigable North Pole this year? I had been thinking 30% or less, but now it looks like it will be navigable by August 20th. There may even be (a) substantial polynya(s) to survive the winter.

--p!

[KingofNewOrleans]

3. Odds of a navigable NP this year?

Less than 1%. It looks likely that this year will break the record sea ice low of 2005. It has been a warm spring/summer in Siberia and points north. Plus low levels of multiyear ice and a steady transpolar drift and you've got a hefty retreat of sea ice.

The color coding should be taken with a grain of salt too, especially away from the ice edge. Surface melt and even clouds can interfere with the accuracy of the graphic from day to day.

[Dogmudgeon]

4. Grain of salt?

So those maps exaggerate the effects of the melting? I've tended to believe them. Thanks for the reality check.

If that's the case, I would go closer to your prediction. I had been thinking of the reports of recent extensive melting and ice break-up close to the pole. But in any of these situations, it's going to be another year of "happening faster than we had anticipated." The melting has been progressing rapidly since the late 1990s.

--p!

[Dead_Parrot]

2. Hmmm

Remind me, someone, what the last prediction for an ice-free Arctic was?

'Cos I think it's going to be wrong.

:(

[GliderGuider]

5. You can't mean

It's happening "Faster Than Expected™"?

[hatrack]

6. It's moved up a bit in the past few years - it used to be ice-free summer by 2080 or 2100

The fastest projection I've heard yet has been about 2040, which is starting to look a bit optimistic. Still, we'll see - fairly complex topic.

[Dogmudgeon]

7. The map just updated

The eastern ice is re-consolidating a little bit, but the western (180°-195° longitude, above Alaska) is becoming markedly thinner and more broken-up.

--p!

[hatrack]

8. Even NIC was showing the N. Beaufort as very chopped up in recent composites

And NIC updates are just about slower than Christmas.

Interesting.