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ktonine

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #200 on: April 02, 2016, 06:29:35 AM »
As far as temps in the Yukon and Alaska go, what is even scarier is what that pertains to health of the permafrost. If it goes too long then the permafrost could melt even faster then expected and that could impact even faster changes in the land then models can handle.

Carmacks and Mayo, the two villages that Friv mentioned, are both in the 'Continuous' permafrost zone.  Both are approximately 63N latitude.  Just north of the British Columbia - Yukon border and just east of the Alaska - Yukon border.

 

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #201 on: April 02, 2016, 07:09:39 AM »
Mayo hit 13.2C today WITH a North wind.  Beating the old record high. Going back to 1925.

That's what snow cover vanishing at 63N on April 1st will do for ya.

Snow albedo effect on grand display.


Carmacks hit 15C today.  Has been at 10C+ for 11-12 hours  with a very strong ESE wind that has veered Southerly as the day progressed.


To be fair the RRR is more of a NPAC feature.  The records being seen here arent from that feature recently.  This ridging is from the nino vortex weakening and sliding West overtime and with wavelengths getting shorter naturally ridging takes place out front.  This event was aided by a nasty 2000 mile+ flow for 2-3 days bringing warm air from the NCPAC to the NAWC.   The ridge was so strong warm air crossed the mtns into be interior.

Very rare
« Last Edit: April 02, 2016, 07:21:04 AM by Frivolousz21 »
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seaicesailor

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #202 on: April 02, 2016, 01:06:46 PM »
Great reference shot of the western arctic from the Canadian Weather Service (GOES 11nm IR image)

Be interesting to check back on this later on.
Last year it was not sunny April but windy April what started the opening of Beaufort water by drift from continent winds. This year this drift happened in February and we have SMI (second month ice) all over the place. If this wind repeats this April and then May is sunny, Beaufort won't be as interesting as last year not making it thru July.
For starters ARC CICE drift model predicts weak drift of this sort in a week, lets see how it plays



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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #203 on: April 02, 2016, 01:17:25 PM »
Fresh off the ASIB press: Winter analysis addendum

Thanks again for shoving those graphs and maps under my nose, guys/gals. My brain usually reacts after seeing something three times.  ;)

Here's what I did:



« Last Edit: April 02, 2016, 01:43:09 PM by Neven »
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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #204 on: April 02, 2016, 02:51:38 PM »
Crack event yesterday or so close to Resolute. Fascinating wrt to the cold air there.

Does anyone know whether it's a glitch or so in the river just east of Ural mountains? Some yellow and green color there at Bremens map.

//LMV

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #205 on: April 02, 2016, 03:04:56 PM »
Great reference shot of the western arctic from the Canadian Weather Service (GOES 11nm IR image)

Be interesting to check back on this later on.
Thanks but could you please add a link? It helps others to trace such images back to source, and you could save us the search for the information you already have.
10.8 micrometers is roughly 11000 nm (to be pedantic as usual)
I attach the AMSR-2 from worldviewhttp://go.nasa.gov/1oqPguy for additional detail (albeit at low resolution) probably showing some differences in thickness although the influence of air temperatures (I guess) makes comparisons over large distances uncertain. Again: lets keep an eye on developments.

PS the image is from the 31.3. sorry, but difference should be small at that resolution.
« Last Edit: April 02, 2016, 03:10:11 PM by Andreas T »

Neven

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #206 on: April 02, 2016, 04:30:40 PM »
Great reference shot of the western arctic from the Canadian Weather Service (GOES 11nm IR image)

Be interesting to check back on this later on.
Thanks but could you please add a link? It helps others to trace such images back to source, and you could save us the search for the information you already have.
10.8 micrometers is roughly 11000 nm (to be pedantic as usual)

I believe jdallen got it from here. Scroll down to HRPT (NOAA polar orbiting).
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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #207 on: April 02, 2016, 04:43:23 PM »
A view of the North Pole from Terra:

http://GreatWhiteCon.info/resources/arctic-sea-ice-images/winter-2015-16-images/#CAB

At around the same time this image was recorded the freshly cleared runway at ice camp Barneo also developed some (rather smaller!) cracks.
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oren

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #208 on: April 02, 2016, 10:36:15 PM »
Fresh off the ASIB press: Winter analysis addendum

Thanks again for shoving those graphs and maps under my nose, guys/gals. My brain usually reacts after seeing something three times.  ;)

Here's what I did:



Great post Neven, and that chart looks scary indeed.
I was wondering why FDDs are measured from 0degC and not from -1.8degC? This would be more appropriate for sea ice formation if I'm not mistaken. Depending on the temperature variability, this could result in slightly different charts than current definition.

Lord M Vader

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #209 on: April 02, 2016, 11:14:29 PM »
Neven, looking at those graph, aside of the incredible heat this winter there is another thing that strikes me and that is how cold August 2013 was when one look at the chart.September 2007 was not too bad either.

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #210 on: April 03, 2016, 08:39:50 PM »
Another shot from the Canadian weather service site (which I forgot to link in the previous post, but which oversight Neven corrected ;)  )

This one provides a much clearer view of the state of the ice in the Beaufort and Chukchi.

There's also some better detail of the ice quality in the approaches to the Fram.

Striking also to me is the apparent thinness of the ice in Baffin Bay. [edit: - in hindsight, this may actually be increased absorption due to atmospheric moisture]

(Link for reference:  https://weather.gc.ca/data/satellite/hrpt_dfo_ir_100.jpg )
« Last Edit: April 03, 2016, 08:45:44 PM by jdallen »
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Andreas T

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #211 on: April 03, 2016, 10:46:33 PM »
The Terra channel 31 which is also 10.8 -11.3 micrometer brightness is very easily accessible on Worldview where you can flick between days and years. By adjusting the colour scale contrasts can be made to stand out more than in the AVHRR black and white images. Resolution may be higher in AVHRR I'm not sure.
You are right that fog which is warmer than the ice surface can make ice appear warmer than it is. You see the intensity of emission of the fog because it emits more than it absorbs of the ice's emission. But the ice surface which probably has some snow cover is also subject to weather dependent temperature fluctuations, looking through a series of days for any region shows that clearly. But of course thicker ice generally is colder and will be therefore show up distinctly among neighboring thinner ice. How well thickness can be compared with ice in more distant regions which may have experienced different surface temperatures i.e. cooling rates is hard to judge.
But as you can see in the attached image http://go.nasa.gov/22327jV last year the ice was colder

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #212 on: April 04, 2016, 05:48:11 AM »
AndreasT - Nice!  I really must play more with Worldview.

What does stick out from your post is how much thinner ice is along the eastern end of the NW passage.

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seaicesailor

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #213 on: April 04, 2016, 09:17:17 AM »
Have a look at Beaufort and tell us what u see (if u wish). I cant make my browser work with that. It is being colder there lately, and thick ice being imported, but a lot of thin ice too ...

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #214 on: April 04, 2016, 11:05:09 AM »
The reason for the thinner ice east of Resolute is that it is younger. It has kept moving through most of the winter http://go.nasa.gov/224OkJu. Not as fast as at the southern end of Nares strait but enough to form a polynia at times. I think most of the ice from Resolute to Baffin Bay originates from ice that formed on a polynia in the preceding months. At present ice at Resolute isn't moving but you can see the outline of an earlier opening in the warmer probably thinner ice. (please note that the image i linked to in my previous post was from 2015). Younger ice also has less snow on it which also allows its surface to be warmed more by the relatively warm ocean underneath.
seaicesailor: worldview does not work as well with Explorer as has been acknowledged by NASA. I use Firefox but Chrome is also ok. If less detail is needed for larger scale features the AMSR-2 89GHz channel is interesting because it is less susceptible to weather. It still shows day to day changes due to cloud and temperature changes but you can still see movement of recognizable features. Wipneus' animations are of course better, they use data from the same sensor but processed in combination with other channels to remove these temperature, cloud and precipitation effects (not entirely). I just like being able to choose the place I want to look at and move back and forth through the days at my own pace. Unfortunately the AMSR-2 images are only available from Jan. AMSRE images are there from 2002 to Sept 2011.http://go.nasa.gov/224Scu9
In either case IR or microwave I can't say how thick ice is in absolute terms. I take colder surfaces as an indication of thicker ice underneath (when air temperatures have been lower than water as they are now) all else being equal. I will keep watching and hope to learn more.
In the attached image notice the line of older floes (blues among green ) stretching to the west from the beaufort gyre.. Also the yellow along the western north coast of Alaska which is probably quite thin ice. Landfast ice is reported to be thinner than usual.

seaicesailor

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #215 on: April 04, 2016, 02:48:27 PM »
The reason for the thinner ice east of Resolute is that it is younger. It has kept moving through most of the winter http://go.nasa.gov/224OkJu. Not as fast as at the southern end of Nares strait but enough to form a polynia at times. I think most of the ice from Resolute to Baffin Bay originates from ice that formed on a polynia in the preceding months. At present ice at Resolute isn't moving but you can see the outline of an earlier opening in the warmer probably thinner ice. (please note that the image i linked to in my previous post was from 2015). Younger ice also has less snow on it which also allows its surface to be warmed more by the relatively warm ocean underneath.
seaicesailor: worldview does not work as well with Explorer as has been acknowledged by NASA. I use Firefox but Chrome is also ok. If less detail is needed for larger scale features the AMSR-2 89GHz channel is interesting because it is less susceptible to weather. It still shows day to day changes due to cloud and temperature changes but you can still see movement of recognizable features. Wipneus' animations are of course better, they use data from the same sensor but processed in combination with other channels to remove these temperature, cloud and precipitation effects (not entirely). I just like being able to choose the place I want to look at and move back and forth through the days at my own pace. Unfortunately the AMSR-2 images are only available from Jan. AMSRE images are there from 2002 to Sept 2011.http://go.nasa.gov/224Scu9
In either case IR or microwave I can't say how thick ice is in absolute terms. I take colder surfaces as an indication of thicker ice underneath (when air temperatures have been lower than water as they are now) all else being equal. I will keep watching and hope to learn more.
In the attached image notice the line of older floes (blues among green ) stretching to the west from the beaufort gyre.. Also the yellow along the western north coast of Alaska which is probably quite thin ice. Landfast ice is reported to be thinner than usual.

Thank you!! Now trying with Chrome. Also great analysis in the other thread too, thx.
Much of the "blue" ice in that image is I believe first year ice, I don't think the Gyre brought so much MYI from central Arctic so far! Or maybe yes. Anyway, seems pretty cold. Interesting.

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #216 on: April 04, 2016, 02:57:57 PM »
NOAA ESRL Temperature figures for March  are out at:

http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/cgi-bin/data/timeseries/timeseries1.pl

Globally temperatures were again hottest for March by a significant amount (~0.4 degC).  In the Arctic (67N+) and above 80N, Air Temperatures hottest on record by a small margin,  with SST's hottest or second hottest, as they all have been all year.
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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #217 on: April 04, 2016, 03:05:30 PM »
So much thin ice in and in front of Amundsen Bay...  :(

If things get as sunny there as they did last year, early in the melting season, the Pacific side is going to get kick(start)ed hard.

I am confused:

I had to look up  Amundsen Bay... which is in Antarctica, as is Amundsen Sea. However, Amundsen Gulf is in the Canadian archipelago (all according to Wikipedia which admittedly is not always correct).

All these names, really a challenge for my memory as age advances  :o
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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #218 on: April 04, 2016, 03:29:04 PM »
Ah yes, Gulf, as in oil spill. Sorry about that.  ;D
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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #219 on: April 04, 2016, 03:34:55 PM »
So much thin ice in and in front of Amundsen Bay...  :(

If things get as sunny there as they did last year, early in the melting season, the Pacific side is going to get kick(start)ed hard.

I am confused:

I had to look up  Amundsen Bay... which is in Antarctica, as is Amundsen Sea. However, Amundsen Gulf is in the Canadian archipelago (all according to Wikipedia which admittedly is not always correct).

All these names, really a challenge for my memory as age advances  :o


Well, I thought about Amundsen Basin (roughly at the pole), but Gulf is much more logical.

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #220 on: April 05, 2016, 08:38:24 AM »
The March PIOMAS daily numbers have been released:

http://GreatWhiteCon.info/2016/04/more-of-the-usual-hype-about-arctic-sea-ice/#comment-214116

2016 Day 91 – 22.337 thousand kilometers cubed

Still in 2nd place behind 2011.
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Neven

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #221 on: April 06, 2016, 11:51:07 AM »
Is Baffin Bay about to get torched or what (also note the forecast temps around Jakobshavn Isbrae). Here's the climax of the forecast in 5-6 days:

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #222 on: April 06, 2016, 03:01:07 PM »
Over the last couple of days much of the landfast ice west of Barrow has broken up and drifted off. The large area of open water there despite refreezing now could make a difference when weather starts to warm up

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #223 on: April 06, 2016, 07:07:26 PM »
Several cracks are visible during the last couple of days. Most pronounced west and east of Barrow but also east of Resolute. Nevens post wrt the very "warm" weather in Greenland and Labrador Sea should increase the odds for a century break or so in the near future as the ice in the southern part of Okhotsk is dissolving. Ice in Chukchi Sea should probably also take a hit soon.

Of interest is also the eventual prospect with north and northeasterly winds east of Greenland. Will possibly push MYI to the Fram Strait.

If we are going to see a full negative AO soon the Arctic will be in very BIG trouble this summer!! Seems like the atmosphere is trying quite hard to go into a full -AO.

Btw, DMI shows that the temps north of 80oN soon may get negative anomalies for the first time this year!!! http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/meant80n.uk.php

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #224 on: April 07, 2016, 12:19:45 AM »
Looks to be a real pause in Arctic temperatures this year.  Spring warming must be a hoax.
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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #225 on: April 07, 2016, 12:30:33 AM »
Is Baffin Bay about to get torched or what (also note the forecast temps around Jakobshavn Isbrae).

Winter has seen a few warm bursts into Baffin area, at the same time Hudson Bay has seemed to cop some of the coldest temperatures for the entire Arctic quite often, and will be well below freezing while Baffin gets torched.  Perhaps Baffin may melt out before Hudson.  If so would that be unusual?
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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #226 on: April 07, 2016, 05:08:58 AM »
Over the last couple of days much of the landfast ice west of Barrow has broken up and drifted off. The large area of open water there despite refreezing now could make a difference when weather starts to warm up

Didn't take long at all to clear the ice away again.

Really off topic but I'm curious...has anyone else noticed on the Barrow cam that the house on the far left always has the back door open ( the one leading to the ramp ). I really want to ask why??

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #227 on: April 07, 2016, 09:54:45 AM »
Expect a lot more ice-pulling-away-from-the coast as the forecast is for a huge and persistent (!) high-pressure area to form over the Beaufort. I'm seeing 1035-1045 hPa on the ECMWF forecast chart. Will post some images later today.

The temperature anomaly isn't that huge and so temps will remain below zero, but can solar radiation due to clear skies make an impact this early in the melting season?

PS What's wrong with LANCE-MODIS? No Mosaic.  >:( :-\ :'(
« Last Edit: April 07, 2016, 10:01:29 AM by Neven »
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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #228 on: April 07, 2016, 11:02:29 AM »
Really off topic but I'm curious...has anyone else noticed on the Barrow cam that the house on the far left always has the back door open ( the one leading to the ramp ). I really want to ask why??
i see it closed LOL perhaps i'm just blind or you mean another one
« Last Edit: April 07, 2016, 11:16:00 AM by magnamentis »

seaicesailor

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #229 on: April 07, 2016, 12:14:40 PM »
Expect a lot more ice-pulling-away-from-the coast as the forecast is for a huge and persistent (!) high-pressure area to form over the Beaufort. I'm seeing 1035-1045 hPa on the ECMWF forecast chart. Will post some images later today.

The temperature anomaly isn't that huge and so temps will remain below zero, but can solar radiation due to clear skies make an impact this early in the melting season?

PS What's wrong with LANCE-MODIS? No Mosaic.  >:( :-\ :'(

According the classic solar radiation graph, at 70 deg latitude, the solar flux is already at 1/3 to 1/2 of its maximum there. I would expect this time there won't be refreezing in the opened waters.
« Last Edit: April 07, 2016, 12:43:55 PM by seaicesailor »

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #230 on: April 07, 2016, 12:22:30 PM »
Really off topic but I'm curious...has anyone else noticed on the Barrow cam that the house on the far left always has the back door open ( the one leading to the ramp ). I really want to ask why??
i see it closed LOL perhaps i'm just blind or you mean another one

Haha, yes, the far left one circled. It's closed now but I swear it's open more times than not! I see this page at least once a day. Just thought someone else might have noticed :)

On topic, I am getting lost in all the graphs and analysis atm since I'm only a hobbyist but I agree so much heat over winter has to go somewhere and do something. I appreciate all the links posted, they help heaps. Sydney city had its hottest April day on record yesterday. Lots of drought in Australia and the wet season in the NT didn't add up to much. Already getting too warm down here...

seaicesailor

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #231 on: April 07, 2016, 12:35:06 PM »
Expect a lot more ice-pulling-away-from-the coast as the forecast is for a huge and persistent (!) high-pressure area to form over the Beaufort. I'm seeing 1035-1045 hPa on the ECMWF forecast chart. Will post some images later today.

The temperature anomaly isn't that huge and so temps will remain below zero, but can solar radiation due to clear skies make an impact this early in the melting season?

PS What's wrong with LANCE-MODIS? No Mosaic.  >:( :-\ :'(

Actually this is what happened last year from April 7 to April 30 around Amundsen Gulf. The open waters indeed refreeze, until there is this big detachment around the 20th. Even so, there are signs of weak refreezing until the end of April.

What a different state of Beaufort BTW.

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #232 on: April 07, 2016, 02:12:54 PM »
Really off topic but I'm curious...has anyone else noticed on the Barrow cam that the house on the far left always has the back door open ( the one leading to the ramp ). I really want to ask why??
i see it closed LOL perhaps i'm just blind or you mean another one

Haha, yes, the far left one circled. It's closed now but I swear it's open more times than not! I see this page at least once a day. Just thought someone else might have noticed :)

On topic, I am getting lost in all the graphs and analysis atm since I'm only a hobbyist but I agree so much heat over winter has to go somewhere and do something. I appreciate all the links posted, they help heaps. Sydney city had its hottest April day on record yesterday. Lots of drought in Australia and the wet season in the NT didn't add up to much. Already getting too warm down here...
On todays image there appears to be a child opening the door and leaving it open but it  seems to get  shut at night. Perhaps it't just  that a chile who  hasn't learned to  keep the heat in. Besides its clearly  a mudroom more out of the house than in the house.
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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #233 on: April 07, 2016, 02:15:42 PM »
Actually this is what happened last year from April 7 to April 30 around Amundsen Gulf. The open waters indeed refreeze, until there is this big detachment around the 20th. Even so, there are signs of weak refreezing until the end of April.

What a different state of Beaufort BTW.

Thanks, sis (also for the solar radiation graph). Yes, the Beaufort was also hit hard and early last year, but what's coming now seems even worse. I may blog about this if I find the time today...
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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #234 on: April 07, 2016, 07:26:23 PM »
This solar power site allows you to set date and latitude to get the solar radiation potential
http://www.pveducation.org/pvcdrom/properties-of-sunlight/calculation-of-solar-insolation

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #235 on: April 07, 2016, 07:33:31 PM »
Neven & Co: NSIDC is now out with their analysis for March and winter. One of the more interesting pics they show is the age of the sea ice. According to that pic there is virtually no old ice left in the basin. The oldest ice is now northwest of Greenland and a small strain in Beufort close to the thinnest ice. The ice northeast of Greenland seems to be in a very bad shape. NSIDC also says that FYI in general is 1,5-2,0 m thick.

See attached pic. Courtesy: National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC).

Further, snow cover was 2nd lowest March cover for 1967-2016.



« Last Edit: April 07, 2016, 07:55:56 PM by Lord M Vader »

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #236 on: April 07, 2016, 07:39:17 PM »
The March 2016 AARI sheep looks like T Rex in this version

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #237 on: April 07, 2016, 09:24:10 PM »
when sunlight returning to the arctic is discussed I often get the impression that the outgoing longwave radiation is overlooked. When skies are clear a lot of radiation is going out, sunshine has to make up for that loss before the surface stops cooling. This is why ice volume grows until the end of April. Only when incoming radiation exceeds outgoing, does warming start,  apart from heat convected to the Arctic of course. Albedo plays an important part in this because albedo is high for snow and ice reflecting much of the incoming radiation, but albedo is low (snow and ice have high emissivity at 10micrometer) for the long wavelengths at which thermal radiation is going out.
The plots below are small and colour scales not easy to distiguish but I haven't found better ones. http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=35555

Jim Hunt

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #238 on: April 07, 2016, 10:16:07 PM »
The sunlight has certainly returned to the Beaufort Sea, and the camera on O-Buoy 13 has defrosted as a consequence:

http://GreatWhiteCon.info/resources/arctic-sea-ice-images/winter-2015-16-images/#OBuoy13

Note the co-located SIMB 2015J and ITP 88.
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Neven

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #239 on: April 07, 2016, 10:57:33 PM »
when sunlight returning to the arctic is discussed I often get the impression that the outgoing longwave radiation is overlooked. When skies are clear a lot of radiation is going out, sunshine has to make up for that loss before the surface stops cooling. This is why ice volume grows until the end of April. Only when incoming radiation exceeds outgoing, does warming start,  apart from heat convected to the Arctic of course. Albedo plays an important part in this because albedo is high for snow and ice reflecting much of the incoming radiation, but albedo is low (snow and ice have high emissivity at 10micrometer) for the long wavelengths at which thermal radiation is going out.

Let's assume this high pressure area over the Beaufort is going to pull the ice away from the coast big time. What do you expect what will happen after that? Freeze over? Or is the incoming shortwave radiation enough to offset the outgoing longwave radiation? Or won't there simply be enough open water, high enough temperatures, and not enough light/Sun too low?
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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #240 on: April 08, 2016, 12:15:26 AM »
You know how the Arctic can surprise us, but I would find it surprising if open water expands in Beaufort much before the end of April. In recent years openings only stay open when the adjoining land starts to loose its snow cover and warms up air blowing over the sea. Of course any freezing will get weaker and weaker until then.
Obuoy13 illustrates the issue of radiation balance well I think. Despite the image showing clear sky, its position at 75N 160W has been clear April 2 and 3 (from modis) and cloudy in the last couple of days. This is reflected in the temperature fluctuations on clear days and higher temperatures with less sunshine (less diurnal fluctuation) the key is the higher windspeed und the southerly direction.
I just want to caution against raising expectations.

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #241 on: April 08, 2016, 12:25:26 AM »
Thanks, Andreas, that's very helpful.
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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #242 on: April 08, 2016, 12:55:12 AM »
This is a guess but looking at the ice age map on NSIDC and some of the thickness maps give some backing for this: There is a band of old floes but it is more scattered than last year and fairly narrow.
Chuckchi is weak in the east and strong in the west (which will melt in the summer too). Weather is key as always, there will be open water, how much dammage this will do depends how soon and how thrings spread from there. Looking back I am struck how weak the ice was in 2013 at this time, and how that turned out.
Attached is AMSR-2 from worldview and I do not claim to fully be able to "read" this.

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #243 on: April 08, 2016, 01:26:24 AM »
This is a guess but looking at the ice age map on NSIDC and some of the thickness maps give some backing for this: There is a band of old floes but it is more scattered than last year and fairly narrow.
Chuckchi is weak in the east and strong in the west (which will melt in the summer too). Weather is key as always, there will be open water, how much dammage this will do depends how soon and how thrings spread from there. Looking back I am struck how weak the ice was in 2013 at this time, and how that turned out.
Attached is AMSR-2 from worldview and I do not claim to fully be able to "read" this.

We need more of these annotations !! Nifty Andreas...

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #244 on: April 08, 2016, 02:00:18 AM »
Well, I've found some time and wrote a blog post on the ASIB: Beaufort under early pressure

You know how the Arctic can surprise us, but I would find it surprising if open water expands in Beaufort much before the end of April. In recent years openings only stay open when the adjoining land starts to loose its snow cover and warms up air blowing over the sea. Of course any freezing will get weaker and weaker until then.
My blog post is also partly about what will happen to the snow in Alaska, given the current temperature forecast:

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #245 on: April 08, 2016, 03:41:06 AM »
Thank you, Neven. Your write-ups are superb!

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #246 on: April 08, 2016, 09:58:53 AM »
The euro blow torches NA.

Snow cover in Canada would be decimated

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #247 on: April 08, 2016, 10:15:30 AM »
Thank you, Neven. Your write-ups are superb!

Thanks, slow wing. I know it's early times and nothing may happen, but I'm expecting a lot of movement on the Pacific/American side of the Arctic, and so I had to write about it.
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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #248 on: April 08, 2016, 01:08:00 PM »
Expect more piling-up of ice in ESS according to the maps Jim Hunt shows at the Barneo thread
http://forum.arctic-sea-ice.net/index.php/topic,1505.msg73386.html#msg73386

The strong drift ceases abruptly there

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #249 on: April 08, 2016, 05:08:22 PM »
From the Atlantic end here in North Western Europe looks like a period of stagnation this side for about 10 days to compensate your end

Great images guys

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