The Arctic ice sheet areal extent has slowly decreased in the month since my last post. It has done so at a rate that is less than the climatological norm as well as less than the melt seen during March and April the past couple of seasons. This should be good news for the areal extent of ice later this season, barring anomalous weather conditions this summer and fall. I want to point out that areal extent does not equal volume extent. The Arctic ice sheet’s volume is lower this year than in past years due to the extensive summer melts that have occurred in consecutive years. As the NSIDC notes, thin ice is more susceptible to summer melting than is thick ice, which makes perfect sense. So to update my last post, here are the corresponding graphs showing the state of the arctic ice sheet as of yesterday:
The extent of the ice sheet graphically looks like this:
The recent La Nina that hung around for the better part of two years has recently ended. As we move toward neutral El Nino conditions this year, what kind of storm systems will the Arctic experience? How long will one-year ice last under even climatological conditions? Will weather conditions this summer and fall only be “normal” or will they be as warm or warmer than recent summers and falls? I’ll keep an eye on developments.