* * * ARCTIC ICE WATCH * * * . . . . . . . . . . silver medal edition

[skids]

It looks like we'll be passing the 2006 record soon, so time for a new thread

Extent graphs

...comparative (does not update often)



...more reliably updated chart:



...multiyear

Weather

Current surface temperature anomolies:



North Poll webcams:

Extent Maps

...current





...historical





... the animation will be posted in a comment below so we don't soak Mr. and Mrs. Slowski's Internet connection.

[skids]

1. Multiyear animation (Slowsky WARNING, large image download)

[joshcryer]

38. Thanks for making that animation. That's just incredible.

And how.

[skids]

39. Oh I didn't make that...

I'd love to take credit for it, but alas, my animations tend to be more stuff like this:

http://s31.photobucket.com/albums/c373/skids7682/pol/

[skids]

2. Well, OK make that really soon...

...or should I say, faster than expected?

It's hard to eyeball the charts, but we could see headlines declaring 2008's clinch on the silver medal by as early as tomorrow afternoon. :hide:

[XemaSab]

4. It ain't over until the 12-year old Chinese gymnasts have their turn

I think predicting a silver medal may be premature.

[skids]

7. No news article yet...

...but on the YoY graph 2008 just passed 2006's lowest pixel.

So unless there's a "puddle" correction in the works, we now have a silver medalist.

The question remains whether that will turn into a gold.

[phantom power]

3. you can really see the effect of last year's wind pattern in that side-by-side.

[XemaSab]

5. My puddle

It's occluded. :(

[XemaSab]

6. Someone moved the netcam!

:o

[jimlup]

8. Looks like we have officially crossed into the Silver region

We may be headed for gold. It all depends on when the deceleration starts and there is no evidence of that yet!? I'll keep hoping for deceleration but...

[XemaSab]

9. Today and last year:

Today and the year before:

[skids]

10. A lot more red there to chew through this year...

...weather "permitting".

[jimlup]

11. I wonder about the consistency of the time at minimum

The decceleration is very sudden so I wonder what the consistency of the time at minimum is. Guess we'd need a Fourier transform of the oscillation graph to tell.

[XemaSab]

12. Might have to do with a weather system moving over the Arctic

:shrug:

[skids]

13. Just add 6 months to the peaks...

They are smooth...

[emmadoggy]

14. Kick.

Yikes. :scared:

[XemaSab]

15. I'm going to put my theory on record

that the ice cam wasn't "moved," but it was attached to a buoy and the buoy floated free and is going in circles. :o

[XemaSab]

16. Have we bottomed out?

:shrug:

:popcorn:

[phantom power]

17. I vote "not yet"

[hatrack]

19. Very unlikely - 2007 sea ice minumum was September 15th, so we've got a ways to go yet

[jimlup]

20. The real question is are we deccelerating yet?

And it looks like maybe but it is still too early to call the beginning of the deceleration. While it is easy to get wrapped up in the day to day cheering, this is actually very scary shit! That we have a Northwest passage already is unnerving!

[hatrack]

18. 8/21 Update - Ice In Canadian Waters - Canadian Ice Service - Parry's NW Passage Nearly 100% Clear

Right on schedule - they said about three weeks at the beginning of the month when the Amundsen Passage cleared, and here we are.

One month to go to annual minimum.

[XemaSab]

21. .

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZU7tzVu2h6k&fmt=18

[jimlup]

22. Looks like we have an honest decceleration

Too early to tell for sure but here's to hoping!

[XemaSab]

23. That top graph is jerkin' my chain

:P

[jimlup]

24. The top graph doesn't update as often...

It is easier to see the top graph but I don't think it is as current. Hopefully, it will soon show the same deceleration. The time is right. We should be almost to the minimum but it does look to have a high variance in time at minimum.

[XemaSab]

25. Half the time it goes down.

Half the time it goes up.

I don't know what to make of it. :shrug:

[XemaSab]

26. Icecam#2 updated!

:bounce:

(And yes, it looks like there's still open water. I wonder if all the freshwater puddles will create areas of strength, weakness, or brittleness when they refreeze? :shrug:)

[Dead_Parrot]

27. If it is freshwater...

...I think it will be stronger - sea ice forms with little pockets of brine in it, which migrate out over a few years: This is one of the reasons multiyear ice is stonger than new ice (the other being, it's usually thicker).

Or, I might be talking rubbish. Take your pick. :D

[XemaSab]

28. Assuming they haven't melted all the way through to the sea and they're fresh

I was thinking maybe the brine and air would be cleared out and you'd get a big solid chunk of pure ice. It might be a little more like an ice cube than a snowball, and it might resist breaking and melting more easily.

But I was also thinking that maybe the non-melted surrounding ice would be more plastic, and would take strain a little more easily, whereas a pure ice lens would snap under strain.

I was also thinking that maybe having a big streak of something different in the middle of an otherwise uniform mass would create a queer area, and that might lead to more melting immediately around the ice. For example, if you had a little surface melt next year the water, instead of percolating through the more porous older stuff might run down the outside of the pure ice lens, creating melt.

Good times. :hi:

[tom_paine]

29. You could probably get this question answered.

Didn't you write one of the artic ice researchers and get a prompt reply?

Most scientists enjoy chatting about their work to interested laypersons. I suspect that, if you started even just a bi-monthly correspondence with the researcher you wrote to, or another one, that you could really become very very VERY knowledgable on this subject.

Just e-mail the researchers who do know the answers, once a month with questions that occur to you like the potential scenarios regarding refrozen ice at the pole, and you will become the E/E resident expert in less than a year.

Just an idea...

[Dead_Parrot]

30. Hey, are you questioning my omniscience?

:hide:
Actually, I did find a some researchers studying exactly this area:

http://www.physics.otago.ac.nz/research/ice/research.html

Might be worth a go if you can wrestle your way past the department secretary.

[XemaSab]

31. Ice porn!

:9

[XemaSab]

32. I think E/E already has too many resident experts...

:eyes: :P

[XemaSab]

33. I got a sorta-answer!

I do not think that there is an obvious answer to your question as the
ice under melt ponds may have different properties than the
surrounding sea ice: for example, at the end of the summer, sea ice
under melt ponds tends to be thinner, but it may (or may not) have
accumulated meltwater in under-ice ponds. Might get tricky.

:bounce:

[Dead_Parrot]

35. Cool...

Poor bugger's now going to have to spend the next three years waist high in melt water trying to figure it out. :(

Thanks, Xema

:yourock:

[Nihil]

34. Camera #1 seems to be cloud-watching again ...

Wonder if this is due to high winds or soft surface ice?
:shrug:

[jimlup]

36. Its going to be close!

Ehk! Hold on to your graphs! At least it bottoming but not just yet.

:yoiks:

[skids]

37. Yup nailbiter. n/t

[hatrack]

40. Friday Kick for the National Ice Center updates . . . .

Which should be out sometime this afternoon.

[jimlup]

41. Uh... houston, we have a problem...

We're about to set the record loss despite last winter's refreeze. If not, it will be damn close. Yikes!

[jimlup]

42. Holy Ice Crystals Batman!

What's up with camera#1 ?

[emmadoggy]

43. No kidding!

It looks like it is under water, looking up to the ice and open water, if you ask me. :wow:

Of course, I could be totally and completely wrong too. :silly:

[XemaSab]

44. .

:popcorn:

[XemaSab]

45. .

:popcorn::popcorn:

[tom_paine]

46. It's STILL MELTING!

Wow, one wonders if this means the beginning of the upwards regrowth phase will be nearly as delayed.

If so, NSDIC is going to have to adjust that graph to provide a minus 4,000,000 sq. km deviation from the mean.

The most interesting part is coming up now...

[XemaSab]

47. No doubt

This is the week when we either have a Gold Medal Edition, or stick with this thread.

[tom_paine]

48. Well, that would be changing the definition of "Gold Medal"

I thought Gold Medal referred to Arctic Summer Ice Minimum, which we still may "win". It's gonna be close.

I am no climatologist, just an interested dilettante, I suppose, but I strongly suspect that the REAL gold medal is going to be in a month, when the ice is even slower to start regrowing.

Soon, we will know for sure...

[jimlup]

49. Meanwhile back at the pole

Damn, it isn't slowing down enough! It should have bottomed and just wiggle around that buy now. We be headed towards a gold thread.

[Dead_Parrot]

50. It going to be a nail-biter, for sure... nt

[jimlup]

51. Maybe, just maybe, we've ....

found a bottom. I hope it holds!