The extended pattern on the 12z EURO in the Arctic Basin is beginning to resemble the setup prior to the 2012 GAC at 500MB. It actually originates from the blob of cold air over the Beaufort around 48 hrs, which drifts towards the Chukchi / ESS and then begins to expand in scope by D10.
With so much open water sopping up so much insolation and massive heat advecting polewards both from the oceans and the continents I would be hard pressed to see a similar event as 2012 GAC *not* unfolding in 2020. I do believe conditions supportive of such an occurrence are beginning to foment in extended guidance.
It should be noted the polar low I mention at the beginning of this post is actually forecast to drop some snow on the highest mountains of the Mackenzie Ranges, and guidance is also beginning to get rather cold for much of Canada by D5-10. This will probably be temporary but it is interesting to see occur in sync with the Arctic anomalies. One other important note is that anecdotally, potent heat in the NE US is correlated with major heat into the CAB, and we are currently looking like we may see a major 594DM+ ridge develop over the US by the end of the extended range as well (at the same time as Canada gets a bit chilly).
I do believe the combination of these factors point to a potent melt period continuing for the foreseeable future, for a variety of reasons. While it is nice to see some hints of winter returning across the highest elevations of the continents, it is disturbing in that this cold should be in the Arctic, and one suspects that an early return of elevated snows in the high and mid-latitudes of the continents would be expedient in advecting even more massive amounts of accumulated oceanic heat into the poles by way of corresponding seasonal -500MB anomalies as we head into August, September, and October.
Case in point, D10 map -- yes I know it is extended, but it perfectly illustrates how cold is "wasted" in the continents on generating unsustainable snowcover (for the time being) which actually brings even more heat into the Arctic.