Snow and Ice in the Northern Hemisphere: Winter 22/23

[Aleman]

The snowsports thread seems to think it's already a lot better this week after recent snows that have taken runs open to over 50%.  More is expected for Europe this week. It should see most Alpine runs open next week along with more widespread settled snow across Europe - not that all models are perfect!

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[johncam]

Sea ice in Barents and around Svalbard exceptionally low for this time of year 

[Midlands Ice Age]

On 17/01/2023 at 10:20, mountain shadow said:

Lack of snow in Western Europe sadly familiar. 

The last week has seen a lot of snow at altitude in the Alps. My son was in Val and claims it had snowed overnight nearly every day.

But I agree the general situation In Europe is not good currently.

Snow levels still average overall with excesses in the USA and Asia compensating for the low European snow levels.

 

Sea ice extent  has also entered a hiatus over the last 10 days.

The sea ice of the  inner Arctic circle areas are still somewhat above normal, but the extension to the outer areas has slowed appreciatively.

As John keeps mentioning the Barents is still struggling, and 'no' it is not at a record low,  as  2016-2017 was  lower with the open water half way to the pole. 

see below -

 from the ASIF as is  -    for the high Arctic 

Although the Barents is a problem, it seems (as usual to me!!), that the last few days have seen the pack ice return towards Svalbard, and that it is the lack of ice outside the ocean itself which is now dragging down the Arctic sea ice extent numbers

Again the SOO and Bering took a large hit and lost some 40% of their extent 2 weeks ago, and it is only now struggling back towards average.

The other smaller sea areas have also lost ground.

As to why - it is difficult to say. Climate Reanalyser shows a static high over the central Arctic, which has reduced the temperatures there down to around climate normal values in the last few days after a surge in the New Year.

          

This is still showing the very cold air in Siberia, with lows of around -60C at the minimum. Also the temps over the Ice pack have fallen back to an average around -30C. But the cold seems to be locked in over Asia and doesn't want to extend into the Pacific very quickly. 

Masie has shown gains over the last 2 days of (+110K) and (+87K).to a total of 13.700K Km2, so maybe the momentum is changing again. 

 

Let us see what happens next, as according to the MOD thread, a possible SSW may be on the cards.

MIA   

[sukayuonsensnow]

3 hours ago, Midlands Ice Age said:

 

          

This is still showing the very cold air in Siberia, with lows of around -60C at the minimum. Also the temps over the Ice pack have fallen back to an average around -30C. But the cold seems to be locked in over Asia and doesn't want to extend into the Pacific very quickly. 

 

On that note, has anyone seen the forecasts for E/NE Asia over the next few days? Perhaps record breaking cold for some including in China.

Mohe in northernmost China deep into the -50s Celsius next few nights. Not sure I've ever seen a BBC forecast temperatures that low. (Also potentially record breaking cold in other northeastern parts of China (including Harbin), Korean Peninsula and notable cold/snow for Japan)

https://www.bbc.co.uk/weather/2035730

That depth of cold may influence things downstream with the jet stream also, which may throw things off like the cold spell in N America did in the run-up to Christmas to the weather patterns in Europe.

Something to watch also.

[Northwest NI]

Good to see us contributing to the white pixels on snow cover chart. 5 days of snow cover in most western parts of British Isles

[Cymro]

48 minutes ago, Northwest NI said:

Good to see us contributing to the white pixels on snow cover chart. 5 days of snow cover in most western parts of British Isles

Fantastic and hopefully puts to bed all the 'lack of widespread, snow coverage' posts seen in the Mod thread at the beginning of the week! 

[Don]

6 hours ago, Cymro said:

Fantastic and hopefully puts to bed all the 'lack of widespread, snow coverage' posts seen in the Mod thread at the beginning of the week! 

Snow has not been widespread enough for me as I have diddly squat, just like during the December cold spell! 😒

[nobble]

Just need the sea ice (yellow) to reach Aberdeen 🤣👍🏻

then northerlies will have a real bite 🥶🥶🥶😇

[Don]

8 minutes ago, nobble said:

Just need the sea ice (yellow) to reach Aberdeen 🤣👍🏻

then northerlies will have a real bite 🥶🥶🥶😇

Still wouldn't bring any snow to my location!! 🤣

[BLAST FROM THE PAST]

This is of note.  The cold gripping Asia and Siberia has and is incredible.   An unofficial -73c has been recorded…..I think that target was reached…I mean this lake doesn’t freeze….it does now in a ‘warming world’….GSM, Major Volcanic eruption….no coincidence at all in my view with cold records getting squashed all over the place across the continents both North and South.

Edited January 24 by BLAST FROM THE PAST

[damianslaw]

3 hours ago, BLAST FROM THE PAST said:

This is of note.  The cold gripping Asia and Siberia has and is incredible.   An unofficial -73c has been recorded…..I think that target was reached…I mean this lake doesn’t freeze….it does now in a ‘warming world’….GSM, Major Volcanic eruption….no coincidence at all in my view with cold records getting squashed all over the place across the continents both North and South.

Cold records in Canada, USA, and China but never Europe it seems anymore!

[BLAST FROM THE PAST]

37 minutes ago, damianslaw said:

Cold records in Canada, USA, and China but never Europe it seems anymore!

And Antarctica, South America, Australia, South Africa…..we are of little importance…..actually no….of huge importance.The  AMOC, and Atlantification of the Arctic Ocean…cyclical….and the last peak/thrust in the cycle was 2017/18…..now we sink colder….and imo we are sinking colder

BFTP

[Northwest NI]

1 hour ago, BLAST FROM THE PAST said:

And Antarctica, South America, Australia, South Africa…..we are of little importance…..actually no….of huge importance.The  AMOC, and Atlantification of the Arctic Ocean…cyclical….and the last peak/thrust in the cycle was 2017/18…..now we sink colder….and imo we are sinking colder

BFTP

Hope you are correct.

[nobble]

Has the Arctic see ice reached Shetland yet ? 🥶🤞🏻

[Midlands Ice Age]

9 hours ago, nobble said:

Has the Arctic see ice reached Shetland yet ? 🥶🤞🏻

An update later ...

MIA

[Norrance]

Interesting that though there have been cold records set in many places this Winter others have had exactly the opposite. Much of Europe for example and the Eastern third of the US. Only two weather reporting sites in E/NE United States have had above average snowfall this Winter. Not surprisingly one is Buffalo and the other is up towards the St Lawrence. Much of the East coast has had no snow at all. Even New York has had no measurable lying snow. Philadelphia has had no snow at all and forecasts suggest that this will be its first snowless Winter in 60 years. Baltimore and Washington also. There has however been a decent snowfall last week a bit further West and around the Lakes including at our friends place in Northern Indiana and at my relatives in various parts of Ontario.

Edited January 31 by Norrance

[mountain shadow]

1 hour ago, Norrance said:

Interesting that though there have been cold records set in many places this Winter others have had exactly the opposite. Only two weather reporting sites in E/NE United States have had above average snowfall this Winter. Not surprisingly one is Buffalo and the other is up towards the St Lawrence. Much of the East coast has had no snow at all. Even New York has had no measurable lying snow. Philadelphia has had no snow at all and forecasts suggest that this will be its first snowless Winter in 60 years. Baltimore and Washington also. There has however been a decent snowfall last week a bit further West and around the Lakes including at our friends place in Northern Indiana and at my relatives in various parts of Ontario.

Quite a typical La Nina response I believe with the North Pacific High, LP into the MId West and ridge bringing milder air to the North East. 

[Midlands Ice Age]

As promised earlier today a sea ice update...

Snow is much as discussed above with some areas 'less' and others having more than usual.

Overall pretty average year now for snowfall. 

 

Sea ice seems to have slowed down dramatically. Up until Xmas things were going along quite well. SInce then,  it has all been very slow.

 

This has occured when the ice normally sweeps into the outer arctic sea ice areas. We seem to be missing this feature this year.

It has now dropped behind all recent years,  and according to the ASIF is now in the third lowest ever.

Why has the slowdown occured?   well in my opinion it is not down to a burst of warmer air into the Arctic.

Infact, as is being reported on here Siberia has had one of the coldest winters for decades.

This cold has now spilled down into China.

So what is going on?  

Well I put it down to the formation of an arctic high centred over  the ESS and Laptev and which has refused to move since Xmas.

        

Infact - you can see above it is still roughly on station although it has drifted slowly into the Central Arctic in recent days.

This has had two major effects on the N H weather -

 1) It has locked in a depression (although it has been refuelled by the Pacific occasionally) east to west across the Bering Sea, blocking a lot of the colder air bottled up in China and Russia from spreading out southwards. This has limited the ice increases in both the SOO and Bering. Two areas that normally drive sea ice growth at this time of year.

 2) We have also seen a semi permanent depression over the Kara and Barents sea - again locked in place by the anticyclone further East, This again has resulted in Kara and Barents struggling to gain much ground,  when it is normally leading the way. The other effect is that we have seen easterly winds come and go towards Svalbard, and it is only more recent that the main ice pack has reached the islands from the East.

The other impact of all this is that a lot of ice export through Fram has been ongoing, which interestingly is allowing very cold air down towards Iceland.

This has shown up by a much larger amount of ice around the Icelandic shores this year. (see below)....

Not quite to the Shetlands yet!!!   (see above!)

 

Screenshot 2023-01-31 18.36.09.png

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Elsewhere, the Baffin ice field is stretching southwards at fairly normal rates and the ice is entering the Labrador Bay coastline.

So it would seem that a central  Arctic high is not good for allowing the ice to spread outwards from within the Arctic Basin. 

We are still seeing an SSW in the outlook - could it be the catalyst for allowing the Arctic cold to burst out southwards?.

 

 MIA

 

Edited January 31 by Midlands Ice Age

[nobble]

On 31/01/2023 at 19:08, Midlands Ice Age said:

As promised earlier today a sea ice update...

Snow is much as discussed above with some areas 'less' and others having more than usual.

Overall pretty average year now for snowfall. 

 

Sea ice seems to have slowed down dramatically. Up until Xmas things were going along quite well. SInce then,  it has all been very slow.

 

This has occured when the ice normally sweeps into the outer arctic sea ice areas. We seem to be missing this feature this year.

It has now dropped behind all recent years,  and according to the ASIF is now in the third lowest ever.

Why has the slowdown occured?   well in my opinion it is not down to a burst of warmer air into the Arctic.

Infact, as is being reported on here Siberia has had one of the coldest winters for decades.

This cold has now spilled down into China.

So what is going on?  

Well I put it down to the formation of an arctic high centred over  the ESS and Laptev and which has refused to move since Xmas.

        

Infact - you can see above it is still roughly on station although it has drifted slowly into the Central Arctic in recent days.

This has had two major effects on the N H weather -

 1) It has locked in a depression (although it has been refuelled by the Pacific occasionally) east to west across the Bering Sea, blocking a lot of the colder air bottled up in China and Russia from spreading out southwards. This has limited the ice increases in both the SOO and Bering. Two areas that normally drive sea ice growth at this time of year.

 2) We have also seen a semi permanent depression over the Kara and Barents sea - again locked in place by the anticyclone further East, This again has resulted in Kara and Barents struggling to gain much ground,  when it is normally leading the way. The other effect is that we have seen easterly winds come and go towards Svalbard, and it is only more recent that the main ice pack has reached the islands from the East.

The other impact of all this is that a lot of ice export through Fram has been ongoing, which interestingly is allowing very cold air down towards Iceland.

This has shown up by a much larger amount of ice around the Icelandic shores this year. (see below)....

Not quite to the Shetlands yet!!!   (see above!)

 

Screenshot 2023-01-31 18.36.09.png

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Elsewhere, the Baffin ice field is stretching southwards at fairly normal rates and the ice is entering the Labrador Bay coastline.

So it would seem that a central  Arctic high is not good for allowing the ice to spread outwards from within the Arctic Basin. 

We are still seeing an SSW in the outlook - could it be the catalyst for allowing the Arctic cold to burst out southwards?.

 

 MIA

 

Thanks for the report MIA

 

as stated above ice growth outwards from the pole has been minimul , will this hamper melt season ?? Or has high. Pressure helped thicken the ice already in place ? 
 

could a late season outward spread of ice still be possible ? 
 

looks like next year will be Shetland’s ice shelf link up 😉❄️🤞🏻

[Midlands Ice Age]

23 hours ago, nobble said:

Thanks for the report MIA

 

as stated above ice growth outwards from the pole has been minimul , will this hamper melt season ?? Or has high. Pressure helped thicken the ice already in place ? 
 

could a late season outward spread of ice still be possible ? 
 

looks like next year will be Shetland’s ice shelf link up 😉❄️🤞🏻

Nobbie..

Two or  three really good questions there.. 

I'll give you my views....

The lack of ice outside the pole itself will not make too much difference.. as it always melts out each spring anyway.

It may mean that any warmer weather from the south will be less modified, but that depends upon the wind direction anyway.. Thus it could also come from the much colder than normal Siberia.

As for ice thickness within the basin, I have taken a look at the ice volume and thickness chart from DMI -

Considering that we are a bit low in extent overall, I think that the thickness in the basin looks OK. Remember anything blueish is likely to melt out in the summer. But there is still a good 2.5 months of thickening left in the season.  I think that high pressure has helped to thicken it a bit. With the possible upcoming SSW, I am reminded of the SSW of 2018 when the cold high pressure over Kara definitely allowed the ice to thicken there.  We will  have to see where any HP sets up as a result of the SSW.  

 

As for the next question - that of -  is it possible it could improve and give a fuller extent?

Undoubtedly YES.   It may be already happening!!!

Todays Masie is the third day on the trot for much larger daily increases. They have been 33K Km2, 125K Km2 and today 53K Km2. The average is normally about 25K Km2 at this point in the season.

Most of this occured in the Kara and Barents region, where the low coverage looks ready now for a surge.. Svalbard will soon be surrounded, except possibly the north coastline, and the ice is showing signs of tracking across the Barents Sea towards the growing ice along the North Russian coastlines and into the Bay of Murmansk. Scattered ice at sea is always a sign that refreeze is likely.

 

Screenshot 2023-02-03 21.00.56.png

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The first signs of ice moving more south in the SOO also occured today.

As to whether  the 'signs'  progress,  we must await the very variable forecasts to settle down,

 Here is the chart (GFS) for today and 3 days out -

          

Not too much change still.    

HOWEVER, as can be seen compared to last Tuesday (see my previous note), the HP has moved towards the central western Arctic. this seems to have enabled ice growth in Barents and Chukchi......    ( (High is good!!?).), and this has pushed the resident low pressure from Barents.

Looking to the Pacific side  - little has changed and it seems into the medium term it will not either.

 

MIA

Edited February 3 by Midlands Ice Age

[Midlands Ice Age]

Twelve or thirteen days since my last update,

Since when the Arctic ice extent has been on a yo yo ride...

The cyclone over the Barents and Chukchi took a big bite out of the ice in that region, and the ice has only slowly been recovering back to its previous trend -

 

It has been recovering in the last week though, and has now almost caught up again.

This 'catch up' seems to have happened as the shattered ice in Barents has been patched up in the aftermath.  

The SOO has grown (as has Baffin), but the ice is now approaching the maximum extent.

I think that the current SSW is now all that can increase the extent values back  into  the last 2 winters extent values. (currently 200K Km2 down).

Jaxa is currently showing an increase in extent , and the extent has gone from 2nd lowest to 5th lowest in the last 3 days.

(Thanks to the ASIF) --

              

 

Currently there are low temperatures in the Arctic (particularly in Eastern Siberia and North East  Canada).

I guess the question is to whether or not the SSW will release this cold to lower latitudes,

Extent still has 3 weeks left for increases, and the volume has a further 6 weeks, so we must keep  a watch for improvements

MIA

 

[Midlands Ice Age]

A week on from my last NH update...

I could simply repost my above efforts...

Since my suggestion above was of a drop of about 200K Km2 on the last 3 years, the Arctic sea ice extent on Masie has behaved like a 'jack in the box'. 

The very next day we saw an increase of 238K Km2 in the extent and this pushed the values up to around the highest for the decade.

Since then there has been daily changes of  (-134K),  (-4K), (-128K),  (-1K) and today an historic  (+308k) increase , leaving us more or less we were 8 days ago.

I do wonder whether this fluctuation is fully accurate - but overall the trends are still positive.

With another 15 days left of the official sea ice increase season there is still scope for large increases (or decreases).

Total extent according to Masie is now at 14,705M KM2, and the target has to be of getting over the 15,000M Km2, to call it a reasonable year. 

Will this be achieved?

Well,  the NH Arctic profile  is changing rapidly at the moment.

Currently the ever present Arctic high over the polar regions has now been displaced southwards ( into the US), by a weak low pressure system.

This has combined with the ever present Bering low,(held in place by the N Pacific ridge), and a less deep Atlantic feature to leave the Arctic quite flat.

Flat atmospheric conditions are good for ice formation in the Arctic at this time of year so we might expect better conditions going forward.

 However the two pronged SSW attack promises to disrupt most normal patterns this year, so I am not making any predictions.

Barents has once again this year been slower than normal to expand.

The sudden  expected SSW induced Northerly forecast over this region might well be expected to push ice extent southwards, and therefor to increase the extent, but it could also increase the ice moving into the Fram Straight which would ultimately be bad for ice, that is if the we get a negative NAO pattern set up.

So, I will take a back seat again now and watch the outcome over the next couple of weeks. 

A view of the the Arctic volume and thickness might be interesting to see in the next 3 weeks. so am posting now for reference.

  

MIA

 

 

 

Edited February 22 by Midlands Ice Age

[Aleman]

DMI seem to be missing some of the Baltic ice. I've followed them for years and they usually concur more or less:

Ice conditions - Finnish Meteorological Institute

EN.ILMATIETEENLAITOS.FI

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The Baltic Sea ice charts of today, report of daily sea ice conditions in Finland and the ice extent.

Edited February 23 by Aleman

[Midlands Ice Age]

4 hours ago, Aleman said:

DMI seem to be missing some of the Baltic ice. I've followed them for years and they usually concur more or less:

Ice conditions - Finnish Meteorological Institute

EN.ILMATIETEENLAITOS.FI

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The Baltic Sea ice charts of today, report of daily sea ice conditions in Finland and the ice extent.

Just a comment Aleman...

Have just seen that Masie sea ice extent shows that the Baltic Sea has risen from 30K Km2 to 68K Km2 in the last 3 days.

It is a small part of a 99K KM2 increase today in the last 24hrs, achieved malnly in Kara and Barents.

 

MIA

[Midlands Ice Age]

5 days since my last update and a couple of hours at hand.

Over the last few days the Ice extent has steadily gained under the new Arctic weather pattern.

It is reshowing an Arctic high straight over the pole

Though so far there is little to indicate this feature is an SSW induced one.

Steady daiiy extent gains of   (+34K), (+43K), (+62K) and today (+95K) have pushed us back near the top of the last 5 years on Masie (see below) and to 9th lowest in the last 18 years on Jaxa.

    

So all in all a fairly average season, but  could still be improvements to come in the next week.

I thought I would reshow the thickness and volume charts produced by DMI  -

    and today's            

Shows little difference in the week.

 A further measuring system (PIOMAS) produced by the ASIF shows more in detail  -

 

          

and shows increased thickness in the Russian seas.

MIA

Edited February 28 by Midlands Ice Age