Arctic sea ice minimum ties for second-lowest on record

There’s a lot of open water in the Arctic this year — and that means a lot less ice than usual. Less ice than in any year on record, except 2012.

Figures released by NASA and the National Snow and Ice Data Center found that the ice reached a minimum of 4.14 million square kilometres on Sept. 10, tying 2007 for the second-lowest sea ice minimum on record.

Scientists were surprised that it didn’t break the 2012 record of 3.41 million square kilometres. That’s mostly because, after a record maximum low set in March, the weather slowed down the melt which usually peaks in June and July.

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“It’s pretty remarkable that this year’s sea ice minimum extent ended up the second lowest, after how the melt progressed in June and July,” said Walt Meier, a sea ice scientist with NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. “June and July are usually key months for melt because that’s when you have 24 hours a day of sunlight – and this year we lost melt momentum during those two months.”

Though the ice loss slowed in June and July, in August two large storms passed through the Arctic basin, once again speeding things up.

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Climatologists are concerned with the warming climate and its effects in the Arctic where it is warming up twice as fast as any other place on Earth. NASA said that a study recently showed that there has not been a record high in Arctic sea ice extents since 1986. However, during that same time, there were 75 new record lows.

“When you think of the temperature records, it’s common to hear the statement that even when temperatures are increasing, you do expect a record cold here or there every once in a while,” said Claire Parkinson, main author of the study and a senior climate scientist at Goddard in a release. “To think that in this record of Arctic sea ice that goes back to the late 1970s, since 1986 there hasn’t been a single record high in any month of the year, and yet, over that same period, there have been 75 record lows. It’s just an incredible contrast.”

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