Tag: mostly-science

Tweet Usually the NH winter is a time when the bets are laid for the summer minimum.  Friend Weasel was not too excited last year although things were, as they were pretty, but not astoundingly (see 2011) low.  This year already astounding things are happening, or perhaps better put not happening, in the Arctic winter.  Not that there is no ice, but there is a lot less ice than expected.  Enough less that 2016 looks like a lock for the lowest global sea ice evah. John Nielsen Gammon has been sending around a frame comparing how in 1922 the farthest north that a expedition could get was 81 o 29′, open ice this year.  Andy Dessler tweeted it  OTOH, the resolution of Cryosphere Today is a bit low, so let’s take a look at the higher resolution images at the University of Bremen from the AMSR2 (2016) and the original AMSR (2003) for February right now and then. But wait, there is even more, at Neven’s Arctic Sea Ice Blog and Gerg has a GIF of  the sea ice in August from the Danish Meteorological Institute’s sea ice maps between 1920 and 1939.  Today’s February looks pretty much icewise like August then