Arctic Ice Discussion (the Refreeze)

[BornFromTheVoid]

Agree

Someone posted on here about 18 months ago an article from a paper written cira 1880s talking about less ice in the artic cira 1870s/80s (I think they were the decades) and how ships could go much further north then in previouls summers.

The artic will always flucuate but the chance of a ice free artic by 2013 (posted 2007) remains very slim.

Here's a quote from a letter from 1881 Titled "The Recent Advance of the Polar Ice in the Greenland and Spitzbergen Sea.", showing their fears of what may happen if the sea ice keeps spreading as it had been.

This winter the ice may spread still further, unless the winds prevail from the south to raise the temperature, drive the iee north and eat into it along its southern edge.

If the winter winds are northerly, we may expect to meet with the ice in the spring, approaching the Faroe Islands on the west, and find it down on the coast of Norway on the east

A map included shows sea ice year round surrounding Jan Mayan, down the east of Iceland and into the Norwegian sea.

If I have time during the xmas holidays in a few weeks, I'll attempt to go through as much of the old literature on Arctic sea ice as I can and give a brief review of of the variations and changes reported.

This is a map from the first international polar year in 1884

I presume the white represents solid sea ice seen as they connected it to the Greenland ice sheet and the grey is somewhat navigable or fragmented and includes the summer max.

[Gray-Wolf]

I think there is a lot of incidental info from the old Whaler logs.The old Whale Hunters obviously needed to know when and where the ice allowed access into the hunting grounds. From the bits I've seen there was a lot more ice around that rendered certain areas 'No go' for the Ships. I have never seen a report from Whalers that made out ice was 'less' than before?

[stewfox]

Interesting read.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/08/110804141706.htm

[Gray-Wolf]

I remember a lot of discussion about this at the time of it's release and it may not be as 'clear cut' as some would have make out? We already know (From mud logs etc) that 'areas' of the Basin were sporadically ice free over the last 12,000yrs as 'natural' climate blips warmed up certain areas whilst leaving other areas untouched? I don't think anyone has issues with localised melt but a lot of folk have stated quite clearly that current , 'basin wide', ice levels are unparallelled since the end of the last ice age? The breakdown, over the past 100yrs, of the arctic ice shelves on Ellesmere Island help highlight how unique todays melt is with only 10% of their pre-1900 extents left (and this calving/melting fast), the same is true of the remaining ice sheet on Devonshire Island now in it's final death throes. Dating of the rock surfaces below (to see when they last saw sunlight) show us continuous cover over the last 12,000yrs so if they are going now what happened over any other periods that were similar to todays losses? why choose to melt now and not then?

[BornFromTheVoid]

According to CT, we're now just 664,000km2 off average, closest since last April. Hudson Bay sea ice is finally beginning to take off, albeit still around 2 weeks late. Cold air looks set to remain here for the foreseeable future, so with the anomaly here closing in, there's a good chance that we'll be within 500,000km2 of average within the next week, though there is something that could mess that up, which I'll mention a little later.

Elsewhere in the Arctic, Kara sea ice is nearing the average mark, but Barents is still far behind where it should be. Most places are getting closer to average, with Bering sea exactly average.

The other sea ice graphs show us as slightly above 07 on NSIDC and pretty much joint 2nd lowest on record on the DMI graph.

As for the overall forecast conditions. There is currently a lot of mild air past 80N, which can be clearly seen on the DMI temperature graph.

The main feature over the next 5 days or so is a huge area of deep low pressure centred over Svalbard which may do some damage to the sea ice from the Greenland sea across to the Kara sea. As well as strong winds disrupting the ice, some mild air looks like getting pumped up along the Russian coast line.

Will be interesting to watch what happens with this set up.

[Village]

I haven't seen anything yet that remotely compares to what we've seen in recent years. A couple of years with low ice levels in 1 or 2 areas and some high SSTs but nothing as widespread as the last half dozen years or so.

I would not expect you to have seen anything like recent years because you and everybody else has not been on this planet long enough and there is no data. We have only had this detailed data for a few decades thanks to satelites and so thats all you have to look at.

Edited November 27, 2011 by Village

[BornFromTheVoid]

I would not expect you to have seen anything like recent years because you and everybody else has not been on this planet long enough and there is no data. We have only had this detailed data for a few decades thanks to satelites and so thats all you have to look at.

Obviously I meant in the literature, not with my own eyes. If you can't trust the sea ice estimates pre-satellite era, then you can't use them as evidence that we've seen this all before earlier in the century.

There is plenty of data, it's just not 100% accurate. None of us were around to see the ice caps extents over the British Isles, but we do know they were here. Based on surface features and proxy data.

[BornFromTheVoid]

Arctic sea ice areas is almost at 1 million km2 blow average once again. On NSIDC we're about even with 2007 and on the DMI charts we're 2nd lowest on record, and without a quick upturn, will be lowest on record in a few days.

Seems my thoughts last week were wrong, despite plenty of cold over Hudson bay recently, the sea ice has continued to move further away from average and is now barely above last years levels, despite very different synoptics. This is likely down to the warm SSTAs. The Kara sea has lost a lot of ice, about -180,000km2 in the last ~10 days or so, to take it 300k below average. The only area currently doing well is around the Bering strait. The Chuckchi and Bering Sea have mustered about a +90k anomaly between them.

[Gray-Wolf]

I'd noted the lack of Hudson ice myself? Last year we had a lot of WAA that would have logically lead to a reluctance to freeze but this year??? All the N.American lakes have been noting temp rises over the past 15yrs so I guess we should imagine Hudson doing similar? Again any late freeze up will only limit ice thickness and allow for an earlier breakup of ice come spring?

As for the main basin I was hoping that this winter we would have reliable thickness measures as I'm of the opinion that 2nd and 3rd year ice are not putting on any extra thickness compared to the first year ice? Maybe later in the season we'll have some basin wide data released?

[Geordiesnow]

Hudson bay had a very hot summer compare to usual though I noticed during the summer time and this Autumn has not had much in the way of sustained cold uppers or winds flowing from Canada/Arctic although it is under a significant cold spell at the moment and the wind direction is favourable for ice to form at the moment so I expect the ice to increase in Hudson Bay.

Perhaps more concerning is the lack of ice in the Kara sea and conditions does not look like improving much around here anytime soon, I was wondering if we keep on having Southerlies around this area, does this mean we would lose less ice than we normally would through the fram stright and this could in turn make the ice on the Russian side of the Arctic more thicker?

[stewfox]

As for the main basin I was hoping that this winter we would have reliable thickness measures as I'm of the opinion that 2nd and 3rd year ice are not putting on any extra thickness compared to the first year ice? Maybe later in the season we'll have some basin wide data released?

Whats with that satalite and all those promised thickness measures

[Gray-Wolf]

Dunno Stew. They pushed out the first swathe of data and then nothing? The open access to data must have been taken up by Universities and they must be building models to run the data sets as a graphic we can all digest at a glance???

My only thought is that the IceBridge mission has show up issues in the data as the Feb swathe of the Arctic showed thicker ice than the data we had???

I'd heard that the dynamic nature of todays ice meant that the sat. was capable of skewed data as each swathe overflew the same patch of ice as it drifted. you could imagine a small area of slabbibg then being painted as a large area of thick ice as the sat. took multiple images of the same patch of ice as it drifted in sync with the sat. above?

Anyhow we have to be closer to gaining the data now than a year ago?

[BornFromTheVoid]

This is the latest I can find on it

http://www.esa.int/esaLP/SEM123FURTG_LPcryosat_0.html

I think one of my lecturers was involved in the calibration of cryosat, so might ask her about getting and using the data in the next day or 2.

[loafer]

Dunno Stew. They pushed out the first swathe of data and then nothing? The open access to data must have been taken up by Universities and they must be building models to run the data sets as a graphic we can all digest at a glance???

My only thought is that the IceBridge mission has show up issues in the data as the Feb swathe of the Arctic showed thicker ice than the data we had???

I'd heard that the dynamic nature of todays ice meant that the sat. was capable of skewed data as each swathe overflew the same patch of ice as it drifted. you could imagine a small area of slabbibg then being painted as a large area of thick ice as the sat. took multiple images of the same patch of ice as it drifted in sync with the sat. above?

Anyhow we have to be closer to gaining the data now than a year ago?

You are the least balanced commentator on this subject ever. Surely it is just as possible for the skew to overread the amount of sea instead of ice as the ice drifts around?!

If I were a cynic (and I am) I would think the lack of data issued is because it isn't reinforcing the "right" messages...

PS - Just to add, my views are similar on the JAXA CO2 data - why isn't it being released? Why, when it was, was the issuer fired?

[Gray-Wolf]

Sorry loafer, I think you are wrong in both your appraisal and opinion. There is nothing wrong in finding, with a rapidly changing system like the Arctic at the current time ,that the goalposts have moved in a direction that you did not anticipate.

Remember this is the second attempt at putting this kit into space so it was 2 years behind the game before it set off. If you look at the fifference between the 07' pack and the 05' pack you'll see how fast thing alter up there.

Only since 08/09' have we seen the current 3 year turnaround of sea ice in the Arctic (as ice ages attest to with 4th and 5th year ice now minimal and paleocryistic no longer to be found in the basin) so the sat was not envisaged to have the 'tracking' issue it may well have shown across sections of the basin.

Surely it is better to have right data than a stream of wrong data?

As for 'right/wrong' messages? You will need to expand on the statement as I'm a tad confused? Isn't there just truth , as substantiated by the data, and lies?

[loafer]

My comment on your confusion is based on the fact that you say that the dynamic nature of ice means that the same piece of ice could be counted twice in successive passes of the satellite. It is equally obvious that the same piece of ice could not be counted at all if it moves such that open sea is seen by successive passes by the satellite as the ice moves.

In terms of data, I, like you, have only one wish, which is accurate objective data which can be reviewed and analysed. In the absence of data, speculation is pointless.

[Gray-Wolf]

Indeed Loafer , indeed. I based my comments on the reports as to why folk saw difference in the culled data from Cryosat and the Icebridge data (which was top heavy?) and so focused on the comments I read .Obviously it works both ways.

[stewfox]

If I were a cynic (and I am) I would think the lack of data issued is because it isn't reinforcing the "right" messages...

PS - Just to add, my views are similar on the JAXA CO2 data - why isn't it being released? Why, when it was, was the issuer fired?

I have to agree it leads to cynicism regardless of wether thats merited.

We knew there would be 6/12 month delay for the scientific community to digest the info then it was going to be spread to a wider community

Maybe their finding far more multi year ice then expected or much thicker ice.

I love this bit

================

Harsh conditions in space – with huge temperature differences between Sun and shade – can lead to the deterioration of CryoSat’s instruments, which can also lead to measurement errors.

In order to quantify these errors, ESA ground controllers are working to recalibrate the altimeter

=================

Harsh conditions in space guess that wasn't expected

Edited December 6, 2011 by stewfox

[BornFromTheVoid]

I love this bit

================

Harsh conditions in space – with huge temperature differences between Sun and shade – can lead to the deterioration of CryoSat’s instruments, which can also lead to measurement errors.

In order to quantify these errors, ESA ground controllers are working to recalibrate the altimeter

=================

Harsh conditions in space guess that wasn't expected

Most polar orbiting satellites use passive sensors and so rely on sunlight for their readings. This one focuses on the poles and uses it's own EM source (synthetic aperture radar), so it can have as many passes as it needs without worrying about daylight for it's readings, as opposed to satellites like MODIS, which as I'm sure you've noticed, ain't great for checking the ice in winter!. That's why CryoSat 2 passes between direct sunlight and frigid darkness often, which isn't always the norm, so it needs to calibrate.

I think when you consider it's making measurements from a distance of over 700km, with an accuracy of just cms, a little re-calibration after nearly 2 years in space makes sense!

Can you not download their data anyway? I thought you used to be able to at least...

The satellite was sent up to get improved sea ice and ice sheet thickness measurements, not to trick anyone or promote AGW beliefs. There are much cheaper ways to go about that.

I don't think we necessarily need it to tell us the Arctic sea ice is in a bad way, plenty of other sources for that.

Here's an animation of all available sea ice minimums from cryosphere today...

[stewfox]

Most polar orbiting satellites use passive sensors and so rely on sunlight for their readings. This one focuses on the poles and uses it's own EM source (synthetic aperture radar), so it can have as many passes as it needs without worrying about daylight for it's readings, as opposed to satellites like MODIS, which as I'm sure you've noticed, ain't great for checking the ice in winter!. That's why CryoSat 2 passes between direct sunlight and frigid darkness often, which isn't always the norm, so it needs to calibrate.

I think when you consider it's making measurements from a distance of over 700km, with an accuracy of just cms, a little re-calibration after nearly 2 years in space makes sense!

Can you not download their data anyway? I thought you used to be able to at least...

The satellite was sent up to get improved sea ice and ice sheet thickness measurements, not to trick anyone or promote AGW beliefs. There are much cheaper ways to go about that.

I don't think we necessarily need it to tell us the Arctic sea ice is in a bad way, plenty of other sources for that.

Here's an animation of all available sea ice minimums from cryosphere today...

MODIS lasted for many many years past its sell by date

You have posted ice variation over a few decades ?

When we get real data like IJIS

We have had no data (general public) for the 18 months its been up there

Ice thickness and area , every day on a graph

Multi year ice is on the up

[BornFromTheVoid]

MODIS lasted for many many years past its sell by date

You have posted ice variation over a few decades ?

When we get real data like IJIS

We have had no data (general public) for the 18 months its been up there

Ice thickness and area , every day on a graph

Multi year ice is on the up

They have released some data, such as a sea ice thickness map last January/February

http://www.esa.int/i...-Feb-2011,0.jpg

It seems they're having some calibration issues at the moment, it's new high tech stuff, not technology which has been established for decades. Things sometimes go wrong. If they wanted to fudge the data, they could do it in a much quieter and less obvious fashion.

As for multi-year ice..., there's always going to be some yearly variability, but a quick look at the video below shows the trend clearly enough in my opinion

[Gray-Wolf]

Thinking about 'Cryosat'. We've had reports , since07', of swells working under the pack (both from the icebreakers and from the spring missions like Catlin) and this would really throw out any measurements taken.

If you think of a 50 cm swell then you have the 'peaks and the troughs throwing out all data over swathes of the ocean by 1/2 a metre! For equipment hailed as accurate to the cm this is far to great an error to be able to use the data?

Such a shame as we still have a few years until ICESat2 comes on line.

The data that ICESat brought us clearly showed a pack that was 'pegged' at 3m and less for all ice age types.

With the onset of 'normal Ocean processes' for part of the year the mixing out of the top (if not all?) of the ancient ,deep, Halocline is a given and explains why 'bottom melt is now as important over summer as surface melt.

The worry here is that this 'mixing can continue year round if swell are travelling under the pack. If you think of a 'wave ' as a complete circle and the 'arc' that forms the swell the top of that circle, you can see how deep this 'disruption' to the water column can be.

I saw some data, post the Alaskan 'Hurricane' from a Buoy 100km from the ice edge that was showing impacts over two weeks on (with warm water rising and cold water dropping from below the ice). This will lead to basal melt once the warm salty reaches the surface.

[4wd]

I would've thought it relatively easy to spot that and take an average.

More open water is a potent negative feedback to global warming - increased humidity leads to greater snowfall depth and extent - reflecting sunlight longer and over a wider area into late spring.

The increased precipitation will cause ice sheet and glacier mass to increase also.

[Gray-Wolf]

Maybe you should offer any scientists struggling with Calibration issues your Advice Four? There's nothing we can do about it here but it is irksome to be promised good data ,freely available, only to be left waiting?

Sadly , no matter what we hope for, the reality on the ground is that extra snow ( the past 2 years here and in N.America/Siberia) and ice (09's extent 'record') do not last and, as we saw last year in Siberia, even record amounts still melt earlier than the 'average' 'melting' date.

We seem to be at the end of a warming process that has lead to the destruction of the polar ice. This may well mean differing weather types across the region (Like the frozen rain blighting the reindeer herders in Lapland/Siberia) but we would need extensive tracts of snow (that are not prone to rapid melt) to offset the problem in the way you say and ,without the sea ice as a platform, the land available is too far south for such to happen without dramatic cooling occuring to facilitate it?

With the sea ice gone the land for 1,500km from the coast is impacted so we have lost the one thing that would have been able to alter the northernmost lands.

If this melt is driven by warm water influx into the Basin then it must have taken many decades to warm enough( beyond what it used to) to then make the journey north and still have enough residual heat to do the job it has done over the past 60yrs (since sub Data noted the first 'thinning').

We have to accept what the data shows us is occuring before we can try and imagine how it will impact us. Making up hopeful stories may comfort us in the short term but do us no service over the long term.

We are blessed, on our Island, by the proximity of the ocean so any climate impacts should be moderated. Recent long term droughts across Europe and the Mediterranean show us a glimpse of what we are to expect. Be it Flood or Drought it appears 'extreme' (compared to what we have been used to) will become the new Norm?

Edited December 8, 2011 by Gray-Wolf

[scotty_boy_winter]

100% agree. The average decline is irafutable and for all to see. While the evidence like this continues to mount then statements of sea ice declining have and will continue to have major mitigation

They have released some data, such as a sea ice thickness map last January/February

http://www.esa.int/i...-Feb-2011,0.jpg

It seems they're having some calibration issues at the moment, it's new high tech stuff, not technology which has been established for decades. Things sometimes go wrong. If they wanted to fudge the data, they could do it in a much quieter and less obvious fashion.

As for multi-year ice..., there's always going to be some yearly variability, but a quick look at the video below shows the trend clearly enough in my opinion

Good post backed up by evidence and good theory. Keep up the good work GW

Maybe you should offer any scientists struggling with Calibration issues your Advice Four? There's nothing we can do about it here but it is irksome to be promised good data ,freely available, only to be left waiting?

Sadly , no matter what we hope for, the reality on the ground is that extra snow ( the past 2 years here and in N.America/Siberia) and ice (09's extent 'record') do not last and, as we saw last year in Siberia, even record amounts still melt earlier than the 'average' 'melting' date.

We seem to be at the end of a warming process that has lead to the destruction of the polar ice. This may well mean differing weather types across the region (Like the frozen rain blighting the reindeer herders in Lapland/Siberia) but we would need extensive tracts of snow (that are not prone to rapid melt) to offset the problem in the way you say and ,without the sea ice as a platform, the land available is too far south for such to happen without dramatic cooling occuring to facilitate it?

With the sea ice gone the land for 1,500km from the coast is impacted so we have lost the one thing that would have been able to alter the northernmost lands.

If this melt is driven by warm water influx into the Basin then it must have taken many decades to warm enough( beyond what it used to) to then make the journey north and still have enough residual heat to do the job it has done over the past 60yrs (since sub Data noted the first 'thinning').

We have to accept what the data shows us is occuring before we can try and imagine how it will impact us. Making up hopeful stories may comfort us in the short term but do us no service over the long term.

We are blessed, on our Island, by the proximity of the ocean so any climate impacts should be moderated. Recent long term droughts across Europe and the Mediterranean show us a glimpse of what we are to expect. Be it Flood or Drought it appears 'extreme' (compared to what we have been used to) will become the new Norm?