Carinthians Latest Arctic Reports - (Summer 2007)

[Optimus Prime]

Whether or not the ice extent in the northern hemisphere can be classed as worrying or not it is unprecedented how long it has got. Certainly ties in with exceptional increase in human population year on year, increased CO2 emissions increased human background warming and possibly a natural cycle.

Very dire in deed, less ice and cold then what there was last year in the northern hemisphere!

[carinthian]

Nice.

C

Jan_Mayen_Island__Norway.htm

[oldsnowywizard]

Where is the Arctic warmth coming from this summer.? Most of the Northern Hemisphere this summer above 45N is only average. Another complication added !

C

hi Iceberg,

Very worrying trend now with rapid loss of ice (including some permanent ice fields ) . Strange that most of the Northern Hemisphere is much cooler this Summer so far above 45 N.

C

the sea ice loss is indeed worrying as is the comment about sea ice being thinner, however with cooler temps 45N and the summer running out, there will less effort for mother nature to cool down the landmasses and therefore perhaps in autumn and winter sea ice levels could recover, provided of course there are no warm plumes!!

be interesting is anyone has any sea temp charts to compare the northern hem between this year and last year... also with the extra melt water is this when we will start to see affects on the NAD?

[BLAST FROM THE PAST]

Where is the Arctic warmth coming from this summer.? Most of the Northern Hemisphere this summer above 45N is only average. Another complication added !

C

Ocean Warming not CO2 warming. I am concerned about this and anticipate shed loads of precipitation this autumn and winter. Remember across the board the Arctic was warmer in the 30s than now but with much less ice loss. Warmer Oceans/melting from below can be the only answer I see.

BFTP

Edited June 29, 2007 by BLAST FROM THE PAST

[Iceberg]

I don't want this to turn into a climate thread but what evidence is there to say the whole artic was warmer in the 30's.?

For the record the anom is not due to dirty data, confirmed by the site. The oceans are certainly warmer I wonder whether weakening NADW production is keeping the sub surface heat up and more poleward.?

[BLAST FROM THE PAST]

I don't want this to turn into a climate thread but what evidence is there to say the whole artic was warmer in the 30's.?

Polyakov et al 2003. Quote the arctic was as warm if not warmer in the 30s and 40s from 62degN to the pole

BFTP

[Iceberg]

Interesting I have lot of respect for Polyakov.

Latest thoughts http://web.mac.com/barber1818/iWeb/IPY-CFL...L_summary-3.pdf

Most GCM's don't model this amount of melting for a good 40-50 years, so I'd largely agree that just surface warming alone isn't the culprit.

The figures between the 30's, 40's and 90's are all pretty much of a muchness, I'd guess that 200-2007 is probably a touch higher.

[BLAST FROM THE PAST]

Interesting I have lot of respect for Polyakov.

Latest thoughts http://web.mac.com/barber1818/iWeb/IPY-CFL...L_summary-3.pdf

Most GCM's don't model this amount of melting for a good 40-50 years, so I'd largely agree that just surface warming alone isn't the culprit.

The figures between the 30's, 40's and 90's are all pretty much of a muchness, I'd guess that 200-2007 is probably a touch higher.

Hi Iceberg

Indeed, the difference IS the ice loss and this would suggest IMO that air temps aren't doing the damage. Don't know about this current decade being higher or not but close-ish.

BFTP

[carinthian]

In 6 hours at the North Pole the sun starts to sink towards the horizon and in exactly 3 months it will sink below the horizon. We will soon be into the Arctic "warm spell" when temperatures around the pole hover around +/- ve 0c for days on end with incoming radition now at its peak. Since the start on June a long pump of warm air into Western Arctic Basin originating from the NW Pacific as far as the Marianas has pushed the temperatures up rapidly in this area ( Eastern Siberia and Alaskan ) Arctic Region where loss of ice has been high. On the otherhand the Baffin cold pool circulation has prolonged a fair bit of winter ice in the Eastern Canadian Arctic. A noticeable feature so far this month has been the upper block over Svalbard (Northern Block ) has kept temperatures to more average levels in the North Baltic/ Kara Seas compared to last year, hence a cooler start to the summer over much of Western Europe.

Slowly over the coming weeks,the Arctic Oscillation will turn into + phase with surface pressure at the pole averaging nearer to 1015 mb.This in turn should see a rise in pressure over the Eastern Canadian Arctic and a "cooler correction " further west in the Arctic Basin .

C

Afternoon,

Further on from the above report the "cooling correction" in the Western Arctic is taking place. The Poleward transfer of heat from the NW Pacific has been cut off for the time being. Short wave radiation readings around the pole do seem to indicate for more cloud cover now than at the period of the summer solstice when abnormal warmth was being advected into the pole.

Thinner than normal ice cover was being measured at this time but latest reports may indice that cooling has thwarted this thermo-dynamics process.

One good piece of encouraging news is the summers retention of sea ice between Spizbergen and its neighbouring North-east Island. Seems much more ice compared to last summer generally in the Euro/Arctic Region. Regular web cam viewers of the 200Om plus volcanic mountain on Jan Mayen Island out in the Greenland Sea will have noticed much more snow retention this summer and also the snow line on Svalbard is much lower than compared to last year.

C

[kippure]

Distant ice

Edited July 4, 2007 by kippure

[oldsnowywizard]

Afternoon,

Further on from the above report the "cooling correction" in the Western Arctic is taking place. The Poleward transfer of heat from the NW Pacific has been cut off for the time being. Short wave radiation readings around the pole do seem to indicate for more cloud cover now than at the period of the summer solstice when abnormal warmth was being advected into the pole.

Thinner than normal ice cover was being measured at this time but latest reports may indice that cooling has thwarted this thermo-dynamics process.

One good piece of encouraging news is the summers retention of sea ice between Spizbergen and its neighbouring North-east Island. Seems much more ice compared to last summer generally in the Euro/Arctic Region. Regular web cam viewers of the 200Om plus volcanic mountain on Jan Mayen Island out in the Greenland Sea will have noticed much more snow retention this summer and also the snow line on Svalbard is much lower than compared to last year.

C

Ice retention seems to have recovered in the Basin, with a better result compared to last year. There is roughly a month or so before we start to see the 850 level cooling to around -5 to -10 and it should be all down hill from there.. good to see that melt levels are also not dropping quite so fast!

a quick overview based on cryosphere...

northern hemisphere - just above 7 million sq kms about the same level as last year. good job we had roughly 500k sq km extra to play around with early this year or the anomoly would have been even worse than -2m sq kms!! if that wasnt bad enough!

artic basin - roughly 3.75m sq km .25m sq km down on the mean... better than last year..

Bearing Sea - NADA

Baffin - 250k sq kms, slightly better than last year.. still dropping

greenland sea - 300k sq kms slightly better than last year, the anomoly level is improving

barents sea - 100k sq kms, slightly better than last year

Kara sea - just above 400k sq kms AND RISING!! (just) much better than last year! but still down on the mean

laptev - 350k sq kms - same as last year and below the mean

east siberian - 550k sq kms, worse than last year and below the mean

chukchi - 250k sq kms - lower than last year and lower than the mean

beaufort - 300k sq kms - lower than last year, lower than the mean

canadian - 450k sq kms - better than last year, lower than the mean

hudson bay - 350k sq kms - better than last year, lower than the mean

mixed results

850hpa temps over the next week or so, show some areas of -5... not bad for this time of year and should help to keep certain areas around or below the 0 mark...

We should have a competition for guessing the final sea ice content? we just need to agree the website used as the control .....

i am going for 4.3million square kms

whats the prize?

Edited July 5, 2007 by oldsnowywizard

[carinthian]

Afternoon,

Further on from the above report the "cooling correction" in the Western Arctic is taking place. The Poleward transfer of heat from the NW Pacific has been cut off for the time being. Short wave radiation readings around the pole do seem to indicate for more cloud cover now than at the period of the summer solstice when abnormal warmth was being advected into the pole.

Thinner than normal ice cover was being measured at this time but latest reports may indice that cooling has thwarted this thermo-dynamics process.

One good piece of encouraging news is the summers retention of sea ice between Spizbergen and its neighbouring North-east Island. Seems much more ice compared to last summer generally in the Euro/Arctic Region. Regular web cam viewers of the 200Om plus volcanic mountain on Jan Mayen Island out in the Greenland Sea will have noticed much more snow retention this summer and also the snow line on Svalbard is much lower than compared to last year.

C

[Guest Viking141]

Erm, yes Carinth, you said that already, something you forgot to add perhaps?

:o

[oldsnowywizard]

Interesting to see a pool of -10 850hpa in the basin over the next few days.. looking at the archive this looks to be quite rare at this time of year..

[carinthian]

Interesting to see a pool of -10 850hpa in the basin over the next few days.. looking at the archive this looks to be quite rare at this time of year..

Hi,

I am going for 4.5 million sq km of summer ice total.

-10C 850hpa, thats locally intense cold upper air around the pole for early July.

Many summers in the Mid to Late 60s had a regular upper air pool over the Higher Arctic Basin of around -5C at that level.

C

[Guest Viking141]

Great changes are afoot I tells ya, and its not for the warmer!

[carinthian]

Erm, yes Carinth, you said that already, something you forgot to add perhaps?

:blink:

Hi Viking,

Sorry, I was trying to show the snow covered volcano on Jan Mayen yesterday. Great web shot,but now under cloud cover.

http:www.jan-mayen.no/ .

Enjoy when you can. Its just an amazing place.

C

[Iceberg]

The coming two weeks look to see more warmer weather coming into the artic circle.

My guess would be 3.7 as the minimum, down from last years. After a bit of rebound the large negative anom has started to go more negative again.

[androcles]

Did any of you see this about Greenland's lush past?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6276576.stm

Interesting.

Andy

[Iceberg]

Partly discussed here.

http://www.netweather.tv/forum/index.php?s...8&start=238

Interesting indeed.

[oldsnowywizard]

The coming two weeks look to see more warmer weather coming into the artic circle.

My guess would be 3.7 as the minimum, down from last years. After a bit of rebound the large negative anom has started to go more negative again.

its certainly going to be interesting to see what happens.. at the moment compared to last year only we see a significant reduction in ice covered area in the Arctic. In fact we are about a month ahead! but this is sea icea area covered, based on the visual maps from cryosphere. to think that during July/August last year the ice area shrunk massively... the question is.. will this happen this year? we already have large areas of open water.. but we also appear to have greater sea ice concentration where it is left...

if you compare last years map...

http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IM...VE/20060708.jpg

you can see that there were substantial areas of light pink... one may argue that this would be easier to melt than...

http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/arctic.jpg

although one could also argue that this year most of the pink areas have already gone!

clutching at straws i guess...

its a sorry sight and is very concerning...

the good news? - evidence of -10 850hpa temps.. some areas doing much better than last year... maybe winter will strat early here and replenish the stock?

antarctica is doing much better!

[BLAST FROM THE PAST]

its certainly going to be interesting to see what happens.. at the moment compared to last year only we see a significant reduction in ice covered area in the Arctic. In fact we are about a month ahead! but this is sea icea area covered, based on the visual maps from cryosphere. to think that during July/August last year the ice area shrunk massively... the question is.. will this happen this year? we already have large areas of open water.. but we also appear to have greater sea ice concentration where it is left...

if you compare last years map...

http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IM...VE/20060708.jpg

you can see that there were substantial areas of light pink... one may argue that this would be easier to melt than...

http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/arctic.jpg

although one could also argue that this year most of the pink areas have already gone!

clutching at straws i guess...

its a sorry sight and is very concerning...

the good news? - evidence of -10 850hpa temps.. some areas doing much better than last year... maybe winter will strat early here and replenish the stock?

antarctica is doing much better!

Ocean warming

BFTP

[carinthian]

In simple terms the positions of the Polar Fronts are subject to very considerable oscillation and displacement according to the temperature distribution and strength of the airflows concerned. It is necessary to emphasive that the postion of the Pacific Polar Front has contined its North-Westwards position to produce an influx of very warm Pacific tropical air from as far as the Philippines into the Polar region of Western Canada and Eastern Siberia. It is here that the current rapid decline in summer ice is concentrated . Air Mass Climatology provides the most rational and embracing answer to this phenomena of heat transfer into the Arctic.

Back in the 1960s ( the cold decade ) in the Northern Hemisphere, the Polar Fronts were both some way from their mean positions (ie) Atlantic Front displaced further south, just as they at present. So it was not unusual to see warmth into the Arctic,but the rate of loss was much smaller then. The picture becomes more complicated with no easy or definate explainations.

C

Evening,

Worrying report today. The continuing poleward heat transfer of very warm Pacific tropical air is taking a terrible toll in loss of sea ice in the Western Canadian/East Siberian Arctic Sectors. Study of the latest sea ice maps show a lot of open water and continued rapid break up if the ice sheet . Today is recording the largest Ice- Anomaly loss for 30 years -some nearly 2 million sq Km less ice. That is a huge portion of summer time ice to lose.

However, the Arctic Basin is currently holding on to its old ice (any loss here would really set the alarm bells ringing ) and the European Sectors are generally better than last summer.

C

[Optimus Prime]

Hi carinthian when does the arctic start gaining ice and snow? And what are the temperatures currently (or normal) for the centre of the arctic in mid summer?

cheers.

[carinthian]

Hi carinthian when does the arctic start gaining ice and snow? And what are the temperatures currently (or normal) for the centre of the arctic in mid summer?

cheers.

Hi OP,

Freezing over of any "melted pools of sea ice " usually occur after the fist week in August at the pole . Temperatures during the summer months hardly change from around the 0c above 85N over a 24 hour period. Loss of summer sea ice continues in the Mid-Lower Arctic until September.

C