March 2015 Status

Data is now in for March 2015, the early maximum is confirmed, temperatures over autumn/winter continue the pattern of recent years, and the volume increase in PIOMAS remains. This year takes volume back to 2010 levels, but the impact of 2007 remains clear. My entry for the 2015 Sea Ice Prediction Network (SIPN) is given at the end of this post.

Large extent of older sea ice in the Beaufort Sea

I have processed images from the Drift Age Model of Fowler/Maslanik/Tschudi to draw attention to the extent of old ice in Beaufort. 2014, like 2013, enters the melt season looking more like a pre-2007 year in the highlighted region.

Rotten sea ice in the summer?

The 2015 melt season has begun, but as is the nature of a near sinusoid, the peak is rather boring with a small rate of change. So to alleviate the boredom, here's a post about compactness. ;)

Sea Ice Maximum 2015

Rather late, due to work commitments, here are my comments on the 2015 sea ice maximum. Three days ago NSIDC provisionally called the maximum at 14.54M km^2, on 25 February 2015. Does this mean anything for the coming season?

Mid March 2015 Status

So far the sea ice extent maximum was set on 22 February 2015, however as of 13 March extent is only 0.14M km^2 below, so it is too early to claim a maximum. That noted there are good grounds to suspect that the 22 February maximum may hold. PIOMAS data is covered at the end of the post.

Lindsay & Schweiger 2015: The thinning of Arctic Sea Ice

This is a rather delayed comment on the excellent Lindsay & Schweiger paper that provides lines of fit to sea ice thickness data. One reason for delay is that I have been awaiting the latest PIOMAS update, now that will have to wait until later this week, because I don't want to bury this post.

Evolution in day to day sea ice extent change.

In the comments to my previous post commenter Pete asked about the changes in the seasonal cycle with regards the date of maximum and minimum. In looking at this apparently simple question it actually has all ended up being rather complex, which may say more about me than the question. So sorry Pete, I still haven't really got a post looking at your question, although I do close by touching upon the issue.

However in playing around with the data, trying to settle on a method that will produce a sound answer, I have ended up being diverted by an idea I thought worth pursuing.