Category Archives: News

The Northwest Passage in 2024

July 15, 2024NewsAqua, Baffin Bay, Beaufort Sea, CAA, CIS, Coronation Gulf, Ilulissat, King William Island, Lancaster Sound, Lumi, Lumina, McClure Strait, MODIS, Nome, NWP, Peel Sound, Viscount Melville SoundJim Hunt

Some “pleasure craft” are currently heading up the west coast of Greenland en route to the Bering Strait via Lancaster Sound and one of the assorted routes through the Canadian Arctic Archipelago. For those of you unfamiliar with the geography of the Northwest Passage, here are couple of hopefully helpful maps:

Whilst there is still ice blocking the route across Baffin Bay from Greenland, the Canadian Ice Service has already started daily coverage of the heart of the southern route through the Northwest Passage. There’s plenty of open water in Lancaster Sound and low concentration sea ice in Prince Regent Inlet:

Further south there is also open water in the Coronation Gulf, but the fast ice between Peel Sound and King William Island has not yet started breaking up:

This slightly cloudy satellite image of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago also shows that the exit of the northern route via McClure Strait into the Beaufort Sea is already navigable:

Facts About the Arctic in July 2024

July 8, 2024NewsArea, AWI, Extent, JAXA, MODIS, PIOMAS, SIPN, Terra, Thickness, VolumeJim Hunt

The first sea ice outlook report for 2024 has been published by the Sea Ice Prediction Network:

This year’s median forecasted value for pan-Arctic September sea-ice extent is 4.48 million square kilometers with an interquartile range of 4.21 to 4.74 million square kilometers. This is slightly lower than the 2022 (4.57 million square kilometers) and 2023 (4.54 million square kilometers) June median forecasts for September.

The lowest sea-ice extent forecast is 3.1 million square kilometers, from the UK Met Office, which would be a new record low for the satellite period (1979-present); the highest sea-ice extent forecast is 5.21 million square kilometers, submitted by both the HEU Group and SYSU/SML-MLM, which would be the highest September extent since 2015:

There are three heuristic Outlooks, with a median of 4.32 million square kilometers and an interquartile range of 4.26 to 4.4 million square kilometers. Statistical submissions total fifteen Outlooks with a median of 4.68 million square kilometers and an interquartile range of 4.47 to 4.9 million square kilometers. There are nine dynamical model contributions. The dynamical models have a median forecast of 3.97 million square kilometers with an interquartile range of 3.68 to 4.35 million square kilometers.

Facts About the Arctic in June 2024

June 1, 2024NewsAge, AMSR2, Amundsen Gulf, Area, Axel Heiberg Island, CAA, Coronation Gulf, Ellesmere Island, Extent, Hudson Bay, Laptev Sea, Melt Ponds, MODIS, Nares Strait, OSI SAF, PIOMAS, Rutgers, Snow Cover, Thickness, VolumeJim Hunt

The JAXA/ViSHOP web site is currently down, so here is the current OSI SAF extent graph for the end of May:

2012’s “June cliff” is almost upon us, and if 2024’s current trajectory continues extent will cross above 2012 for the first time since February in a week or so.

Here’s the GFS model’s current map of snow depth:

Melt ponds are now visible on the ice in the Laptev Sea:

Facts About the Arctic in May 2024

May 6, 2024NewsBarents Sea, Beaufort Sea, Bering Sea, Bremen Uni, Chukchi Sea, Coronation Gulf, CryoSat-2, Extent, Fram Strait, Hudson Bay, JAXA, John Robson, Mackenzie River, MSLP, NSIDC, PIOMAS, Rutgers, Sea Of Okhotsk, SMOS, Snow Cover, Temperature, Thickness, Volume, YouTubeJim Hunt

Since a certain “sceptic” has recently been comparing 2024 sea ice extent to “20 years ago”, here’s the current JAXA/ViSHOP extent graph of selected years, including 2004:

The CryoSat-2/SMOS merged Arctic sea ice volume graph finishes on April 15th, but older data is being reanalysed and here is the latest version:

The gap in the near real time data due to the problem with the SMOS satellite during the first half of March has been filled in, but the result doesn’t look very convincing to say the least!

The PIOMAS gridded thickness data for April 2024 is now available. Here’s the end of month volume graph:

Facts About the Arctic in April 2024

April 4, 2024NewsBeaufort Sea, CryoSat-2, DMI, Mackenzie River, MODIS, PIOMAS, SMOS, Temperature, Terra, Thickness, VolumeJim Hunt

Starting this month with a look at assorted volume/thickness data, here is the CryoSat-2/SMOS merged Arctic sea ice thickness map for March 31st:

Plus the associated volume graph, which still suffers from a gap in the near real time data due to the problem with the SMOS satellite during the first half of March:

The PIOMAS gridded thickness data for March 2024 is also available. Here’s the end of month thickness map:

Plus the calculated volume graph:

Especially for Peter, here too is the DMI’s chart of monthly Arctic sea ice volume for March:

Facts About the Arctic in March 2024

March 2, 2024NewsAMSR2, AWI, Concentration, CryoSat-2, ESA, Extent, Greenland Sea, JAXA, Lars Kaleschke, Ron Clutz, Rutgers, Sea Of Okhotsk, SMOS, Snow Cover, Tony HellerJim Hunt

It looks as though the 2024 Arctic sea ice melting season has begun. For much greater detail see the 2024 maximum extent thread. However, here’s the latest JAXA Arctic sea ice extent graph:

Here too is an animation of sea ice motion on the Atlantic periphery, showing the effect of the passage of several Arctic cyclones through the area over the past 5 weeks or so:

[Update – March 4th]

My usual start of month processing hasn’t gone according to plan. Thanks to Lars Kaleschke at the Alfred Wegener Institute for the following information:

SMOS went into safe mode on 22 February 2024 at 05:10 UTC for reasons that are still under investigation.

The spacecraft has been back in nominal mode since 25 February 2024 and on 27 February 2024, the MIRAS instrument was switched on and is currently performing well.

The reload of the nominal acquisition planning is underway, and if all science data quality checks are positive, nominal data production and dissemination will resume in the coming days.

Facts About the Arctic in February 2024

February 2, 2024NewsAMSR2, Area, AWI, Barents Sea, Bering Sea, CAA, Cyclone, Extent, Fram Strait, GFS, JAXA, MODIS, MSLP, NSIDC, Odden Ice Tongue, PIOMAS, Ron Clutz, Snow Cover, Storm Ingunn, Temperature, Terra, Thickness, Vilkitsky Strait, Volume, WavesJim Hunt

A change is perhaps even better than a rest? Let’s start February with a reminder that following close behind another recent Arctic cyclone, Storm Ingunn caused red weather warnings for high winds and avalanches in Norway two days ago:

By yesterday evening another long period, storm driven swell was arriving at the sea ice edge in the Fram Strait, and to a lesser extent in the Barents Sea:

By this morning Ingunn had merged with the remnants of the prior cyclone, as revealed in Climate Reanalyzer’s visualisation of the latest GFS model run::

The 2023 Arctic Report Card

January 10, 2024NewsAge, CAA, CIS, CryoSat-2, Extent, ICESat-2, McClure Strait, NOAA, NSR, NWP, SMOS, ThicknessJim Hunt

The 2023 Arctic Report Card has been published by the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). All sorts of things are discussed in the report, but sticking to Snow White’s speciality of sea ice here’s an extract:

Facts About the Arctic in January 2024

January 1, 2024NewsAge, ASIF, CryoSat-2, ECCC, Ellesmere Island, Extent, Greenland, JAXA, Nares Strait, NOAA, NSIDC, OSI SAF, PIOMAS, Sentinel, SMOS, Snow Cover, Snow Water Equivalent, Thickness, VolumeJim Hunt

Happy New Year to one and all.

Whilst waiting for the all important thickness and volume data to arrive, we’ll start the new year in traditional fashion with a graph of JAXA extent:

Facts About the Arctic in December 2023

December 19, 2023NewsAMSR2, Atmospheric Rivers, AWI, CryoSat-2, Extent, JAXA, NSIDC, PIOMAS, Santa Claus, SMOS, Thickness, VolumeJim Hunt

Christmas is rapidly approaching, and Santa and Snow White send festive greetings to one and all from the North Pole:

JAXA extent currently seems to be stuck on December 17th, but here’s how it looked a couple of days ago:

The Great White Con

Putting the Arctic sea ice record straight