Tag Archives: CryoSat-2

The 2019 Maximum Arctic Sea Ice Extent

March 1, 2019ExtentAMSR2, Beaufort Sea, Bering Sea, Chukchi Sea, CryoSat-2, DMI, Extent, FMI, Hamburg Uni, JAXA, NSIDC, OSI SAF, Sea Of Okhotsk, SMOS, St. Lawrence, Thickness, WipneusJim Hunt

March 2019 has arrived, which in recent years has proved to be by far the likeliest month to contain the maximum extent of Arctic sea ice for the year. To begin with, here’s our favourite high resolution extent graph calculated by “Wipneus” from University of Hamburg/JAXA AMSR2 data:

Hopefully you can plainly see the pronounced sharp peak towards the end of February 2019? The current maximum Arctic sea ice extent for 2019 is 13.83 million square kilometers on February 22nd. Here’s Arctic sea ice area for good measure:

The current maximum area for 2019 is 13.10 million square kilometers, also on February 22nd. Here too is the NSIDC’s 5 day averaged extent:

This reveals a current maximum extent for 2019 of 14.705 million square kilometers on February 24th.

At this juncture you may well be wondering what the cause of that sudden sharp peak might be? Here’s your starter for ten:

Whilst overall Arctic sea ice area is unremarkable for the current decade, sea ice area in the Bering Sea is remarkable low for the time of year! What’s more much like last year the Chukchi Sea is not currently full to overflowing with sea ice, and is also lowest for the date in the AMSR2 satellite records:

I’ve also been experimenting with the new gridded CryoSat-2/SMOS thickness data from the Finnish Meteorological Institute, which reveals this:

That’s a weekly overview dated February 24th, but it does perhaps explain how such a large area of sea ice could melt so swiftly?

As luck would have it the skies are reasonably clear over the Bering Strait this morning (UTC). Here’s Terra’s view from on high of the current situation:

Terra's view of the Bering Strait on March 1st 2019 — Terra’s view of the Bering Strait on March 1st 2019

[Edit – March 1st PM]

The “low resolution” version of JAXA extent has fallen once again today:

Do you suppose that the current maximum of 14.19 million square kilometers on February 22nd will hold until All Fools’ Day and beyond?

[Edit – March 2nd]

An animation of recent movements of sea ice in the Bering and Chukchi Seas:

Note the recent spread of open water across the southern Chukchi Sea.

[Edit – March 3rd]

Another angle on the Chukchi Sea, plus significant areas of open water now becoming evident in the Beaufort Sea:

[Edit – March 5th]

Some alternative views on Arctic sea ice thickness:

PIOMAS via Wipneus:

Blended CryoSat-2/SMOS:

plus close ups of the Bering/Chukchi area:

and the Atlantic periphery:

Please note the change of scale.

[Edit – March 6th]

Arctic sea ice extent is currently rebounding:

although not in all the peripheral seas:

[Edit – March 7th]

High resolution AMSR2 area and extent both declined today:

Long distance swells are already reaching the Bering Sea, with much more to come:

[Edit – March 9th]

Wipneus’ trusty Raspberry Pi hasn’t crunched the high res AMSR2 numbers yet, so let’s take a look at some other extent metrics.

Here’s JAXA’s “low res” AMSR2 numbers:

Here too is the NSIDC’s 5 day average:

By special request from Michael Ohere for the first time is the DMI’s take on Arctic sea ice extent:

In addition, here is the underlying sea ice concentration data from the OSI-SAF:

Since Michael is also asserting that there currently exists “the greatest February Arctic sea ice extent (according to DMI) in your blog’s history”, here’s Arctic sea ice area excluding the extremely peripheral Okhotsk and St. Lawrence regions:

P.S. Wipneus’ Pi has processed the AMSR2 data now, and area shows another, more modest, decline today:

In addition, here is the underlying sea ice concentration data from the University of Hamburg:

[Edit – March 10th]

Both area and extent increased today:

including increases on both the Atlantic:

and Pacific sides of the Arctic:

[Edit – March 11th]

Both area and extent are still moving inexorably upwards:

The late February maximum still holds, on the high resolution numbers at least. The JAXA/VISHOP web site is down at the moment, so we’ll have to wait for an update to that particular metric, as well as a post weekend update to the NSIDC’s Charctic chart.

P.S. Jaxa is still down this afternoon, but here’s the latest from the NSIDC:

[Edit – March 13th]

Arctic wide area and extent have blasted past their respective late February maxima:

However Arctic sea ice area excluding the Okhotsk and St. Lawrence peripheral regions has still not exceeded the maximum formed on January 25th:

[Edit – March 14th]

This morning’s data reveal the first decline in extent for several days:

The (extremely!) tentative new maximum Arctic sea ice extent for 2019 is 13.89 million square kilometers on March 12th.

[Edit – March 15th]

JAXA is back!

UH AMSR2 confirms that extent is still declining:

[Edit – March 16th]

Arctic sea ice extent continues to decline, whilst area is still flatlining:

Meanwhile a look at freezing degree days based on the DMI’s dubiously weighted data for north of 80 degrees reveals the story of the freezing season. A historically warm start, but now back in amongst the pack of the 2010s:

[Edit – March 17th]

It looks as though there’ll be no going back from this. Arctic sea ice area is finally following extent’s decline in no uncertain terms:

Barring exceedingly unforeseen circumstances after this year’s “double top” that leaves the 2019 Arctic sea ice maximum extent numbers as follows:

UH/Wipneus AMSR2 – 13.89 million square kilometers on March 12th
JAXA/VISHOP AMSR2 – 14.27 million square kilometers on March 12th
NSIDC 5 day SSMIS – 14.78 million square kilometers on March 13th

[Edit – March 19th]

Arctic sea ice area has fallen off the proverbial cliff over the last few days. There can now be no doubt that the 2019 maximum extent has been reached:

That being the case, all other Arctic sea ice discussion for the month of March can now take place over at:

Facts About the Arctic in March 2019

[Edit – March 21st]

The NSIDC have provisionally confirmed this year’s maximum extent:

On March 13, 2019, Arctic sea ice likely reached its maximum extent for the year, at 14.78 million square kilometers (5.71 million square miles), the seventh lowest in the 40-year satellite record, tying with 2007. This year’s maximum extent is 860,000 square kilometers (332,000 square miles) below the 1981 to 2010 average maximum of 15.64 million square kilometers (6.04 million square miles) and 370,000 square kilometers (143,000 square miles) above the lowest maximum of 14.41 million square kilometers (5.56 million square miles) set on March 7, 2017. Prior to 2019, the four lowest maximum extents occurred from 2015 to 2018.

The date of the maximum this year, March 13, was very close to the 1981 to 2010 median date of March 12.

Please note this is a preliminary announcement of the sea ice maximum. At the beginning of April, NSIDC scientists will release a full analysis of winter conditions in the Arctic, along with monthly data for March.

Facts About the Arctic in January 2019

January 12, 2019ThicknessAARI, AMSR2, CryoSat-2, Cyclone, DMI, Donald Trump, FDD, JAXA, Nancy Pelosi, NSIDC, PIOMAS, Polar Vortex, Shutdown, SMOS, Zack LabeJim Hunt

We generally write our periodic reports on the state of Arctic sea ice around the time the PIOMAS volume numbers are published. It seems as though we’ll have a long wait for that to happen at the moment though. According to The Economist today:

America’s government shutdown has become the longest in history. Hundreds of thousands of federal workers remain either stuck at home or forced to work without pay. To reopen the government President Donald Trump is demanding $5.7bn for his border wall. Nancy Pelosi, who presides over the most polarised House of Representatives in recent memory, does not want to give it to him.

and according to the Polar Science Center at the University of Washington:

Due to the US Government Shutdown, PIOMAS ice volume and thickness data which depend on federal government generated reanalysis products, are currently not updated.

Instead of PIOMAS, let’s start instead with the January 2019 edition of the National Snow and Ice Data Center’s Arctic Sea Ice News:

As 2018 came to a close, Arctic sea ice extent was tracking at its third lowest level in the satellite record, while sea ice in the Antarctic remained at historic lows. Slightly faster growth in the first few days of the new year, mostly in the Pacific sea ice areas, has the daily sea ice extent at fifth lowest as of this post.

Now let’s take a look at our favourite high resolution AMSR2 area and extent metrics:

You can see that towards the end of December Arctic sea ice extent was verging on lowest for the date, since when it has risen quickly to reach highest for the date in the brief AMSR2 records a few days ago.

The NSIDC also mention the US Government shutdown:

Unfortunately, as a result of the partial government shutdown, we are unable to access the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) pages to retrieve information on atmospheric air temperatures and sea level pressure patterns. Instead, we turn to daily (2 meters above the surface) mean air temperatures north of 80 degrees North from the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) operational model. This analysis shows that air temperatures remained above the 1958 to 2002 average for all of December.

That brings us on to our Arctic freezing degree days graph, based on DMI data:

After a very slow start to the freezing season the FDD numbers are now vying for second place with last year, behind the astonishingly warm winter of 2016/17. In the absence of the PIOMAS volume numbers we can at least take a look at sea ice thickness. Here’s CryoSat-2:

followed by SMOS:

and since a change is as good as a rest here’s the latest map from the Russian Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute for good measure:

All those sources seem to be agreed that large areas of both the Barents and Kara Seas are currently covered by young thin ice. Finally, for the moment at least, let’s take a look at some extracts from the NSIDC’s review of 2018:

January 2018 began the year with record low sea ice extents for the Arctic as a whole.

The seasonal maximum, reached on March 17, 2018, was the second lowest in the satellite record. While low extent persisted through April and May, sea ice loss during early summer was unremarkable despite above average 925 hPa air temperatures over the Arctic Ocean and Eurasia.

Air temperatures over the Arctic Ocean in July were below average, followed by above average temperatures in August. In fact, on average, August temperatures were higher than July temperatures in 2018. This is highly unusual in the Arctic and something not seen in at least 40 years.

The September 2018 seasonal minimum extent ended up slightly above the long-term linear trend line, tying with 2008 for the sixth lowest in the satellite record. After the minimum, the ocean was slow to freeze up, and October sea ice extent ended up as the third lowest. However, ice growth was very rapid in November, such that November 2018 extent approached the interquartile range of the 1981 to 2010 median. Nevertheless, large amounts of open water remained in the Barents and Chukchi Seas. By the end of December, ice conditions in the Chukchi Sea were back to average, while extent remained unusually low in the Barents Sea.

Coverage of old ice (greater than 4 years old) over the Arctic continued to decline. Such old ice covers only 5 percent of the area it used to in 1980s.

[Edit – January 13th]

Arctic sea ice area and extent have both been falling over the last few days, possibly as a result of the recent cyclone which created strong northerly winds in the Fram Strait. This is from Earth at 09:00 UTC on January 10th, showing a MSLP of 946 hPa:

Here’s what used to be referred to as JAXA extent:

Meanwhile up in the stratosphere at 10 hPa the polar vortex has gone into reverse:

Or to be more precise:

So I was being overly colloquial?!

Continuing your line of argument, the northern hemisphere winter vortices are now plural and no longer "polar"? They are "Siberian" and "Canadian"?

— Snow White (@GreatWhiteCon) January 13, 2019

Facts About the Arctic in October 2018

October 21, 2018VolumeArea, ASIF, CPOM, CryoSat-2, DMI, Extent, FDD, Hamburg Uni, JAXA, PIOMAS, SMOS, Volume, Wandel Sea, WipneusJim Hunt

A somewhat belated start to our October 2018 coverage, but firstly please take a look at this graph:

Following a remarkably sluggish refreeze this year JAXA extent is currently the lowest for the date since their records began. Meanwhile Wipneus has just released his mid month PIOMAS volume update on the Arctic Sea Ice Forum:

That graph reveals that Arctic sea ice volume has been increasing much more slowly than usual during October. The fact that the DMI freezing degree days graph is currently below all previous years in their records no doubt has something to do with that:

Wipneus has also updated the mid month PIOMAS gridded thickness map:

That’s the output of a model of course, but here too is the CPOM version of CryoSat-2 “measured” thickness:

Both sources agree that there’s a remarkable lack of thick ice in the Wandel Sea off north east Greenland this Autumn.

For a handle on the areas of thinner ice where refreezing is taking place around the periphery of the pack, here’s the latest SMOS map:

Finally, for the moment at least, here’s our favourite high resolution AMSR2 area and extent metrics based on JAXA data processed by the University of Hamburg to produced gridded concentration which is then used to derive area and extent by the inimitable Wipneus once again:

[Edit – October 28th]

Here’s the latest thickness maps from SMOS:

and CryoSat-2:

There’s been a recent rapid refreeze, leaving large areas of thin ice around the edges of the central pack:

Facts About the Arctic in April 2018

April 3, 2018VolumeCryoSat-2, Extent, JAXA, NSIDC, PIOMAS, SMOS, Thickness, VolumeJim Hunt

First of all Wipneus has been very quick off the mark this month with his PIOMAS gridded thickness map. Here is what it reveals for the last day of March:

Here too is the latest PIOMAS volume graph:

together with the associated anomaly graph:

They show 2018 still in second lowest position, albeit much closer to third place than last year’s line, which is currently leading the pack by a considerable margin.

By way of comparison here are the current Arctic sea ice thickness maps from SMOS:

and CryoSat-2:

All eyes are still on the Bering and Chukchi Seas, where significant extent declines look likely over the coming days.

[Edit – April 4th]

The official PIOMAS graph including March 2018 is now available:

Meanwhile, according to NIPR/JAXA, Arctic sea ice extent is once again lowest for the date since their records began:

[Edit – April 6th]

The NSIDC 5 day averaged extent is now in “lowest in our records” territory:

Meanwhile “JAXA” extent has just edged above 2016!

[Edit – April 11th]

The focus has been on the Bering and Chukchi Seas until now. However there were clear skies over the Mackenzie Delta yesterday, revealing some open(ish) areas in the Beaufort Sea:

NASA Worldview “true-color” image of the Beaufort Sea on April 10th 2018, derived from the MODIS sensor on the Terra satellite

There’s only the merest hint of a blip on the area graph so far though:

It will be interesting to see if the decline in Beaufort Sea area continues from here, or whether this year’s “flatline” resumes and continues for a while longer.

[Edit – April 19th]

It’s not so apparent on the other extent metrics, but as the periphery melts the high resolution AMSR2 version looks to be heading into virgin territory on the downside:

The 2018 Maximum Arctic Sea Ice Extent

March 25, 2018ExtentAMSR2, Barents Sea, Bering Sea, Bremen Uni, CryoSat-2, Extent, Hamburg Uni, JAXA, NIPR, NSIDC, Sea Of Okhotsk, SMOS, WipneusJim Hunt

According to the latest edition of the National Snow and Ice Data Center’s “Arctic Sea Ice News”

On March 17, 2018, Arctic sea ice likely reached its maximum extent for the year, at 14.48 million square kilometers (5.59 million square miles), the second lowest in the 39-year satellite record, falling just behind 2017. This year’s maximum extent is 1.16 million square kilometers (448,000 square miles) below the 1981 to 2010 average maximum of 15.64 million square kilometers (6.04 million square miles).

The four lowest seasonal maxima have all occurred during the last four years. The 2018 maximum is 60,000 square kilometers (23,200 square miles) above the record low maximum that occurred on March 7, 2017.

Here’s a close up view of recent maxima via the NSIDC’s Charctic interactive sea ice graph:

Next let’s take a look at extent data from the Japanese National Institute of Polar Research, colloquially referred to as “JAXA extent”

In this case the maximum was 13.89 million square kilometers, also on March 17th.

Here too are the extent and area graphs based on Wipneus’ processing of the University of Hamburg’s AMSR2 based concentration data:

They highlight the surge in Arctic sea ice area in the middle of March due to the sudden “cold snap”:

Looking at the third Arctic dimension, here’s the latest SMOS thickness map from the University of Bremen:

and here’s the latest CryoSat-2 thickness map:

They reveal large areas of relatively thin sea ice in the Okhotsk and Barents Seas where the ice can now be expected to melt as quickly as it formed. There is also remarkably little sea ice in the Bering Sea for the time of year:

The 2017/18 Festive Season in the Arctic

December 7, 2017VolumeASIF, Axel Schweiger, Chukchi Sea, CryoSat-2, DMI, Ivana Cvijanovic, NSIDC, PIOMAS, Rebecca Woodgate, SMOS, Thickness, Volume, WipneusJim Hunt

Christmas is coming, and Santa’s secret summer swimming pool has frozen over once again. However the same can’t be said for the Chukchi Sea! More on that in due course, but first let’s take a look at the PIOMAS volume graph at the end of November, courtesy of the wondrous Wipneus on the Arctic Sea Ice Forum:

2017 is currently third lowest, behind 2012 and 2016. Next let’s take a look at Wipneus’ PIOMAS Arctic sea ice thickness map:

followed by the University of Bremen’s SMOS Arctic sea ice thickness map:

Note the large area of pale blue open ocean still visible in the Chukchi Sea towards the top left of both maps.

For another perspective on Arctic sea ice thickness here’s the latest Cryosat-2 map, which currently is based on the month up to November 24th:

Finally, for the moment at least, here’s our very own Arctic Freezing Degree Days graph based on the DMI’s >80N data:

2017 is currently occupying the wide open space between the astonishingly low numbers last year and all previous years in DMI’s record. Here’s their graph for 2017 so far:

[Edit – December 10th]

Current Arctic sea ice area and extent derived from the University of Hamburg’s high resolution AMSR2 data:

Plus the latest update on the Chukchi Sea situation:

[Edit – December 20th]

Wipneus has released his mid month PIOMAS update for December:

The Chukchi Sea is now mostly covered in sea ice, as is the Kara Sea. Volume is still 3rd lowest behind 2016 and 2012.

Whilst on the subject of sea ice thickness a related subject is sea ice age. Here’s a new paper on that topic:

“A new tracking algorithm for sea ice age distribution estimation”

Note that these assorted sea ice age maps are all for January 1st 2016!

Watch this space!

Facts About the Arctic in April 2017

April 2, 2017AreaBremen Uni, CryoSat-2, DMI, IMB 2017A, Lamar Smith, Nares Strait, PIOMAS, SMOS, Snow Cover, UHJim Hunt

Particularly in view of all the balderdash concerning “climate science” being spouted in Washington DC on Wednesday lets first of all run through some Arctic sea ice facts from April 1st 2017 or thereabouts:

Northern Hemisphere Snow Extent:

Arctic Sea Ice Area:

Arctic Sea Ice Extent:

Arctic Sea Ice Concentration:

Thin ice map from the University of Bremen SMOS:

Thick ice map from CPOM CryoSat-2

Beaufort Sea ice thickness growth graph:

DMI sea ice temperature map:

DMI atmospheric temperature graph:

DMI Arctic Freezing Degree Days:

PIOMAS volume for March will follow in a few days, but it’s extremely unlikely to be anything other than “lowest for the date”.

What preliminary conclusions can we draw from this plethora of pretty pictures? First of all the Arctic hasn’t suddenly gone into “deep freeze” mode. Temperatures above 80 degrees north are rising again and are well above the climatology. Freezing degree days are still the lowest on record by a wide margin. Northern hemisphere snow cover is falling fast and is currently just above last year.

In contrast to last year, and thanks to lots of cyclones and very little in the way of anticyclones, there’s plenty of sub half meter sea ice in the Laptev and East Siberian Seas and hardly any in the Beaufort Sea. There’s also plenty of thin ice to be seen on both the Atlantic and Pacific peripheries.

The usual southerly arch hasn’t formed in the Nares Strait between Greenland and Ellesmere Island, and as SMOS shows the sea ice in the strait is consequently very thin. That leads one to wonder when the northern arch in the Lincoln Sea might give way.

It’s not immediately apparent from the still images above, but there’s been relatively large amounts of “old ice” exported from the Central Arctic on the Atlantic side, hence the recent increase in overall extent which is now second lowest for the date (since satellite records began). Area has been creeping up as well over recent days, but is still lowest for the date, as it has been for most of the last year. Sea ice “compactness” has decreased somewhat and given all the thin ice around the edges extent will soon start dropping once again.

All in all, the Arctic sea ice prognosis is not good. Are you watching Lamar Smith? (Pun intended!)

[Edit – April 4th]

The March PIOMAS update is out! As suspected, Arctic sea ice volume is still by far the lowest on record:

Volume on March 31st 2017 was 20.398 thousand cubic kilometers. The previous lowest volume for the date was 22.129 thousand km³ in 2011.

Here too is the PIOMAS modelled Arctic sea ice thickness map:

PIOMAS daily gridded thickness for March 31st 2017

[Edit – April 12th]

The latest edition of the NSIDC’s Arctic Sea Ice News confirms that their monthly extent metric for March 2017 was the lowest in the satellite record for the month:

As well as highlighting the anomalously warm temperatures across much of the Arctic:

the NSIDC article includes this telling pressure anomaly map:

There’s also mention of a new paper:

New work by an international team led by Igor Polyakov of the University of Alaska Fairbanks provides strong evidence that Atlantic layer heat is now playing a prominent role in reducing winter ice formation in the Eurasian Basin, which is manifested as more summer ice loss. According to their analysis, the ice loss due to the influence of Atlantic layer heat is comparable in magnitude to the top down forcing by the atmosphere.

Facts About the Arctic in March 2017

March 4, 2017VolumeAARI, AMSR2, Area, Chaunskaya Bay, CIS, CryoSat-2, Cyclone, DMI, Extent, Lars Kaleschke, NWS, PIOMAS, SMOS, Thickness, VolumeJim Hunt

The February 2017 PIOMAS Arctic sea ice volume numbers are out. It’s no longer surprising to report that they are the lowest ever for the month of February in records going back to 1979:

Here’s the PIOMAS gridded thickness map for February 28th:

whilst here’s the latest CryoSat-2 thickness map:

and here’s the latest SMOS thickness map from the University of Bremen:

Lars Kaleschke suggests via Twitter this revealing SMOS thickness animation:

@GreatWhiteCon If you want to quantify the recent dramatic #Arctic sea ice decay with SMOS, better use this data pic.twitter.com/UTgDzYWEV7

— Lars Kaleschke (@seaice_de) March 4, 2017

There does seem to be a small patch of slightly thicker ice in the East Siberian Sea off Chaunskaya Bay, but there’s still a much larger area of sub 0.5 meter thick ice in the Laptev and Kara Seas.

The Danish Meteorological Institute’s temperatures for the “Arctic area north of the 80th northern parallel” graph shows somewhat more “normal” readings in February 2017, but still without falling below the ERA40 climatology this year or in 2016:

The graph of cumulative Freezing Degree Days (FDD for short) is still far below all previous years in DMI’s records going back to 1958:

Finally, for the moment at least, here’s the high resolution AMSR2 Arctic sea ice area and extent:

I’m going to have to eat some humble pie, or crow pie as I gather it’s usually referred to across the Atlantic, following my tentative “2017 maximum prediction” a couple of weeks ago. Both area and extent posted new highs for the year yesterday, with area creeping above 13 million square kilometers for the first time this year.

[Edit – March 7th]

Commenter Michael Olsen suggests that “thicker ice being pushed into the Alaskan and Russian parts of the Arctic Ocean”. Here’s some evidence:

The United States’ National Weather Service current sea ice stage of development map for Alaskan waters:

This week’s Canadian Ice Service sea ice stage of development map is expected later today, so for now here’s last week’s:

and here’s the latest version:

Similarly this week’s Russian Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute ice chart ~~is expected soon~~ has been published:

[Edit – March 11th]

Especially for Michael, a visual image of all the “thicker ice [that’s been] pushed into the Russian parts of the Arctic Ocean” courtesy of the nice folks at NASA:

NASA Worldview “true-color” image of the Chukchi Sea on March 10th 2017, derived from the MODIS sensor on the Aqua satellite

[Edit – March 12th]

Yet another strong Arctic cyclone has been battering the sea ice in the Arctic Basin. According to Environment Canada this one bottomed out at 971 hPa at 06:00 UTC today.

Alternative Facts About the Arctic in 2017

February 2, 2017ThicknessCryoSat-2, ESS, Icebreakers, JAF, Malcolm Roberts, NOAA, Shock News, SMOS, Steven Goddard, TwitterJim Hunt

Yesterday I found myself in conversation with Nigel and “Steve” on Twitter about NOAA’s recent report on Arctic temperatures and the seemingly unrelated topic of Russian icebreakers. Apparently Nigel has been perusing “Steve’s” recent railing against NOAA’s “Red Hot Arctic” in 2016 on his “Deplorable Client Science” blog. Here’s how my conversation with Nigel went:

It appears that Nigel believes that an image like this:

is far more relevant than an image like this:

when it comes to determining the thickness of “the ice up in the north of Russia”!

Then of course there was my “conversation” with “Steve” after he butted in on my “debate” with Nigel. It went like this:

https://twitter.com/jim_hunt/status/826924807124025345

https://twitter.com/jim_hunt/status/826926389152583682

Shock news! Sea ice forms slowly after a large El Nino! Whoever would have imagined? https://t.co/vKX81jzdxY

— Tony Heller (@Tony__Heller) February 1, 2017

https://twitter.com/jim_hunt/status/826930170439274501

Last week Arctic sea ice was growing very quickly. This week it isn't.
The Navy predicted it would be ice-free by 2012. https://t.co/hg0mmJ3SYw

— Tony Heller (@Tony__Heller) February 1, 2017

https://twitter.com/jim_hunt/status/826937934171480064

https://twitter.com/jim_hunt/status/826940688734494721

Yes, the global warming scam is dead now! https://t.co/FyApD2CSX2

— Tony Heller (@Tony__Heller) February 1, 2017

https://twitter.com/jim_hunt/status/826944199840903169

Followed the next morning by:

https://twitter.com/jim_hunt/status/827120539764457472

Just like Nigel, “Steve” still hasn’t got around to commenting on my map of Arctic sea thickness or explaining the significance of 2 Russian icebreakers NOT stuck in the East Siberian Sea.

[Edit – February 3rd 2017]

Some more pertinent facts, courtesy of CryoSat-2:

I’ve just submitted this article to a brand new learned journal. The Journal of Alternative Facts:

https://twitter.com/jim_hunt/status/827458574515318784

According to their article guidelines self references are highly desirable, so I figured I should add some.

[Edit – February 4th 2017]

Nigel still refuses to provide any more “evidence” about the Russian icebreakers allegedly “stuck in ice”, whilst “Steve” continues to ignore me:

https://twitter.com/jim_hunt/status/827807996331843584

The Journal of Alternative Facts article guidelines insist on peer review by politicians, so I’ve invited a few local, national and international politicians to comment on my draft paper:

https://twitter.com/jim_hunt/status/827823720609746944

[Edit – References]

White, S. (2016a) – The 11th Key Science Moment of 2016

White, S. (2016b) – Post-Truth Global and Arctic Temperatures

White, S. (2015) – Why It’s So Hard to Convince Pseudo-Skeptics

Please feel free to add your peer reviews in the space provided for that purpose below.

NSIDC and CryoSat 2 Agreed Upon Declining Arctic Sea Ice

October 19, 2016ThicknessCryoSat-2, Extent, NSIDC, ThicknessJim Hunt

CryoSat-2 has burst back into life after its summer break. Here is what it reveals about Arctic sea ice thickness at the moment:

Perhaps not entirely coincidentally, the NSIDC 5 day average Arctic sea ice extent is once again less than on the same day of 2012, the year of the “record melt”:

The Great White Con

Putting the Arctic sea ice record straight