At the beginning of July the JAXA/ViSHOP web site is undergoing maintenance yet again! Here here is how their 2 day average extent graph looked for July 1st:
Extent is currently second lowest for the date, above 2025 by a whisker.
Looking next at temperature anomalies across the Arctic, the Beaufort and Chukchi Seas are slightly cooler than the 1979-2000 climatology. However, the East Siberian Sea and particularly the Canadian Arctic Archipelago are well above what used to be considered “normal”:
For those of you unfamiliar with the names of the assorted islands and channels of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago here is a map that hopefully helps:
Plus another map detailing the routes through the Canadian Arctic Archipelago that have previously been successfully navigated by vessels large and small:
The sea ice in Lancaster Sound and the Amundsen Gulf is breaking up, and melt ponds are now visible on the fast ice across much of the southern route through the Canadian Arctic Archipelago:
“False colour” image of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago on June 17th from the MODIS instrument on the Terra satellite
The melt ponds previously visible in the Coronation Gulf now appear to have drained:
“False colour” image of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago on June 3rd from the MODIS instrument on the Aqua satellite
Looking at 2 dimensional data to begin with, CAA sea ice area is currently in the middle of the AMSR2 era pack:
To get a better feel for what might happen during the coming summer season here too is the state of play in the third dimension, courtesy of the Alfred Wegener Institute’s last combined thickness data of the winter from the Cryosat-2, Sentinel 3 and SMOS satellites:
Let’s also take a look at the Canadian Ice Service‘s sea ice “stage of development” charts. Here’s the most recent one for the “Western Arctic”, from June 15th:
There is no old ice anywhere on the southern route, so the stage seems set for the Northwest Passage to open relatively early this summer, with a final “choke point” in the Larsen Sound/Franklin Strait region.
Note that there is a potential fly in the NWP ointment, a recurrence of last year’s winds that blew old ice in the Beaufort Sea close to shore in the Amundsen Gulf during the first half of August!
It’s going to be more difficult to follow traffic on the Northern Sea Route this year, because the Russian authorities are no longer publishing daily position information for ships using the route.
However other sources revealed that things got underway early this year. On May 29th the nuclear icebreaker Ural led LNG tanker Christophe de Margerie through the Vilkitsky Strait into the Laptev Sea:
On June 5th the modest convoy is about to pass Wrangel Island into the Chukchi Sea:
Another nuclear powered icebreaker, Yakutiya, has also just made its way through the Vilkitsky Strait heading east:
If Yakutiya is leading a convoy of one or more other vessels through the pack ice in the Laptev Sea they have all got satellite AIS turned off!
[Update – June 8th]
Christophe de Margerie has passed through the Bering Strait, and thus completed the first west to east voyage through the Northern Sea Route this year. Ural has been left behind in the Chukchi Sea:
Yakutiya has travelled north of the New Siberian Islands and entered the East Siberian Sea:
[Update – June 15th]
Christophe de Margerie has just passed through the Bering Strait heading north on a return journey through the NSR. This time around Yakutiya is leading the way:
[Update – June 22nd]
Yakutiya and Christophe de Margerie have just passed through the Vilkitsky Strait heading west:
The skies were fairly clear over the central Northern Sea Route this morning, revealing the fast ice breaking up in the East Siberian Sea and plenty of melt ponds in the Laptev Sea:
“False colour” image of the Laptev and East Siberian Seas on June 22nd from the MODIS instrument on the Terra satellite
[Update – June 30th]
Christophe de Margerie is back in the Laptev Sea heading east, this time accompanied by Boris Davydov, another LNG tanker. The nuclear icebreakers are all in the Kara Sea, on the other side of the Vilkitsky Strait:
The JAXA/ViSHOP web site is currently undergoing maintenance, but here is how their 2 day average extent graph looked for June 2nd:
Extent was 3rd lowest in the JAXA record, behind 2016 and 2019.
The Alfred Wegener Institute’s sea ice concentration data shows that the Bering Sea is now largely free of sea ice, and the areas of open water in the Beaufort, Chukchi, East Siberian and Laptev Seas continue to expand:
The sea ice concentration map also shows open water in much of Lancaster Sound. Also apparent is the widespread presence of melt ponds along the southern part of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago. Here’s a closer, albeit somewhat cloudy, look:
“False colour” image of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago on June 3rd from the MODIS instrument on the Aqua satellite
JAXA have updated their visualisations of Arctic sea ice extent data. The “traditional” 2 day average graph is now labelled “preliminary”, and currently shows 2026 in a tie with 2020 for third lowest for the date:
5 day averaged “confirmed” data is also available, including regional graphs. By way of example here’s JAXA’s latest extent graph for the Bering Sea, dated May 15th:
The Alfred Wegener Institute’s sea ice concentration data reveals open water in the Beaufort, Chukchi, East Siberian and Laptev Seas:
In early April JAXA Arctic sea ice extent is 3rd lowest for the date, albeit in a “statistical tie” with last year:
The Alfred Wegener Institute’s regional extent graphs reveal an intriguing divergence on the Pacific periphery, where sea ice extent in the Sea of Okhotsk is at an all time low for the date in the AMSR2 record:
On the other hand extent in the Bering Sea is close to an all time high:
On the Atlantic periphery extent is less extreme, although there is currently open water north of Svalbard:
JAXA Arctic sea ice extent has just reached a new high for the year. At 13.76 million km² extent is currently 4th lowest for the date, just below last year’s maximum of 13.78 million km²:
JAXA extent is currently lowest for the date in their record going back to 1979. It’s highly likely that the metric peaked on March 7th which is a new record low maximum, albeit by a mere 20 thousand km²:
By way of a contrast, the National Snow and Ice Data Center’s 5 day averaged extent maximum of 14.29 million km² was reached on March 15th:
Here is the mid month update on the AWI’s CryoSat-2/Sentinel 3/SMOS Arctic sea ice thickness map:
Here too is the associated sea ice volume graph:
Next here are the ERA5 MSLP and 925 hPa air temperature anomaly maps for February 2026, now in “Greenland down” orientation to match the thickness maps:
together with the NSIDC monthly average extent graph for February:
Hudson Bay has fully frozen over during January. However, there is still open water north of Svalbard and in the North Water Polynya. It’s even possible to go swimming in the Nares Strait according to the latest AMSR2 concentration map from the Alfred Wegener Institute:
JAXA extent is currently 3rd lowest for the date, in a “statistical tie” with 2017:
Looking at the third dimension next, PIOMAS volume was second lowest for the date by a whisker at the end of January:
The Fifth US National Climate Assessment was published in November 2023 during the Biden/Harris administration. Here’s the announcement by Zeke Hausfather on X/Twitter:
After three years of work by a team of over 750 scientists, we are releasing the US 5th National Climate Assessment today!
We see greater impacts of climate change on the US since the 2018 NCA4 report, but also some encouraging signs of progress.https://t.co/2WZOLOXoKo
The Global Change Research Act of 1990 mandates that the US Global Change Research Program (USGCRP) deliver a report to Congress and the President not less frequently than every four years that “integrates, evaluates, and interprets the findings of the Program and discusses the scientific uncertainties associated with such findings; analyzes the effects of global change on the natural environment, agriculture, energy production and use, land and water resources, transportation, human health and welfare, human social systems, and biological diversity; and analyzes current trends in global change, both human-induced and natural, and projects major trends for the subsequent 25 to 100 years.”
You may well have noticed that Kamala Harris lost the subsequent election? Hence the Sixth US National Climate Assessment will be prepared during the term of the current Trump/Vance administration.
Regular readers will recognise some or all of those names, and it will not surprise you to learn that there was plenty of pushback from a wide range of climate scientists. In particular, the “Climate Experts’ Review of the DOE Climate Working Group Report“, led by Andrew Dessler and Robert Kopp was published at the end of September 2025. This report begins as follows:
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