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Lord M Vader

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2850 on: July 15, 2020, 08:58:08 PM »
And after the bombcyclone a heat dome might enter the Atlantic side. The sea ice might get a really tough week!

Friv, from Tidbits I "only" see the bombcyclone down to 972 hpa.

FishOutofWater

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2851 on: July 15, 2020, 08:58:29 PM »
Phoenix, my apologies. I see that there is legitimate confusion on how to measure and or estimate the energy balance over the Arctic ocean. One participant, who's name I forget, pointed out that the energy balance and surface temperatures change when the melt ponds drain. However, I'm not seeing evidence of the whitish surface that we see in August after the melt ponds drain.

May I remind everyone that the experts and their models have not done better at predicting the September minimum than the consensus of amateurs and professionals at this forum. Some of the models used by experienced scientists have been pretty damn bad at predicting September extent.

So, I suggest that we all recognize that we all have a lot to learn, especially me. I'm perplexed by the energy balance over the past month because I see many inconsistencies. I am also very disturbed that the stratospheric end warmings of the polar vortex the past 2 years have been so sudden and intense and appear to be contributing to rapid warming over the polar region that extends from the surface high to the upper stratosphere. And even the experts, such as Judah Cohen, struggled to explain the physics of what happened this spring with the end warming. Things are happening that need better understanding and explanation.

Note that there could be a sudden transition to a strong positive Arctic oscillation in September or perhaps mid August and that the warm water in the Barents sea will tend to displace the stratospheric polar vortex towards the Atlantic side of the Arctic.



RoxTheGeologist

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2852 on: July 15, 2020, 08:59:12 PM »
...
1.  I think the notion that energy in the open Waters that are very warm next to the ice DOESN'T contribute quite powerfully to melting adjacent ice is utter rubbish.
...

Particularly if there is a warm wind blowing out of Siberia picking up water vapour. Each gram of water vapor melts 4g of ice if it condenses.

Glen Koehler

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2853 on: July 15, 2020, 09:02:20 PM »
Also HYCOM 7 day forecast. Whole CAA is basically gone.  :o
  ...plus ice retreat along north coast of Greenland.
« Last Edit: July 15, 2020, 10:42:27 PM by Glen Koehler »
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uniquorn

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2854 on: July 15, 2020, 09:06:47 PM »
A very unusual image:
https://GreatWhiteCon.info/2020/07/facts-about-the-arctic-in-july-2020/#Jul-15
Thanks Jim. Here is a contrast adjusted version of https://go.nasa.gov/2OpqJFS to bring out more melt pond detail. There is some light cloud in places on this image (edit:which is a day later.)
Click for full res and unaltered image

Added the histogram for the original image, mean intensity(unweighted) = ~205/255, 80% as a first approximation for visual freq range albedo. ;) obviously should have taken the graticule out for that..
« Last Edit: July 16, 2020, 03:30:59 PM by uniquorn »

pearscot

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2855 on: July 15, 2020, 09:07:34 PM »
Remember the 'greyening' earlier this year, Pearscot?

https://forum.arctic-sea-ice.net/index.php/topic,176.msg261819.html#msg261819



Wow that is terrifying! It boggles the mind to think about the amount of fresh water injection the oceans are getting from Greenland this year. If you look around the Greenland coast (especially north and west) you will notice it's covered in extensive melt ponds/rivers. A few of the melt ponds I measured over over 3 miles long.

And wow, if that vortex actually happens I can only imagine what will happen to the ice. Plus if it were to clear after that and go back to a high/compaction this year will be stunning.
pls!

Aluminium

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2856 on: July 15, 2020, 09:10:04 PM »
100+ messages here per day is not a good sign for the ice.

Juan C. García

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2857 on: July 15, 2020, 09:11:47 PM »
That model does not like ice.
  :D ...  :o ...   :(

It seems that the discussion from now on will be if 2020 will be "just?" 2nd lowest or it is able to become the lowest on record.
« Last Edit: July 15, 2020, 09:17:14 PM by Juan C. García »
Which is the best answer to Sep-2012 ASI lost (compared to 1979-2000)?
50% [NSIDC Extent] or
73% [PIOMAS Volume]

Volume is harder to measure than extent, but 3-dimensional space is real, 2D's hide ~50% thickness gone.
-> IPCC/NSIDC trends [based on extent] underestimate the real speed of ASI lost.

FishOutofWater

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2858 on: July 15, 2020, 09:14:16 PM »
The ECMWF model has become quite unstable over the Arctic beyond 168 hours. It reversed the wind field totally from flow off of Siberia to flow off of northern Canada and a 972mb low over the Beaufort sea & offshore of the CAA. Both the European and American models are showing possible pattern shifts to a stormier Arctic ocean in a week. Maybe there's a shift coming in the Arctic oscillation as soon as next week.

I'm still struggling to understand how there can be less energy than average affecting the ice in the central Arctic when the thermal anomalies are quite positive as they are now.

« Last Edit: July 15, 2020, 09:51:02 PM by FishOutofWater »

Phoenix

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2859 on: July 15, 2020, 09:22:56 PM »
Phoenix, my apologies. I see that there is legitimate confusion on how to measure and or estimate the energy balance over the Arctic ocean.

Thank you very much FOOW. I have leaned quite a bit on Nico's site as a tool to try and get a sense of what's going on and his outlook is a bit of a departure from the conventional wisdom here. I got lucky today that he showed up and at least demonstrated that some contrary perspectives are in good faith.

One hopes the understanding moves in a more objective quantitative direction where possible.


Pagophilus

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2860 on: July 15, 2020, 09:48:12 PM »
Watching Aluminium's AMSR2 gif today (# 2765) it was hard to avoid the feeling that the main pack is trying to peel off the Greenland/Canadian coasts, causing the uniform set of cracks open up, and that maybe the main pack is starting to veer en masse towards the Siberian side.  Uniquorn's great ice drift gif (# 2822) seems to show ice just itching to further detach along those coasts.  But that would be utterly crazy, wouldn't it?   Wouldn't it??  After all, in a rotation more material comes in to replace that which has been lost. OK, I'll stop there.

I guess, in any case, that once the high ends (in 4-5 days), new weather systems and surface winds would put paid to such net motion anyways...

Yeah, it's a bit off putting how all the sudden there's so much chatter about an imminent slowdown upcoming. I'm certainly expecting some days in the forecast with less melting than would be expected, but ONCE AGAIN, the central pack is about 2/3 clear. Other than the Beaufort, pretty much all regions are are in rough shape and I'm becoming increasingly more convinced of a direct correlation between the Greenland mega crack and Laptev warmth/open area (but I'll wait and watch more before saying more).

Either way, I still feel like July has a lot more in store and with the forecast maintaining the high I'm under the assumption that as the pack rotates, ice outside (south) of the 80 degrees latitude will be subject to both top and bottom melt as it's transported into the Laptev.

You may delay, but time will not.   Benjamin Franklin.

KenB

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2861 on: July 15, 2020, 09:53:25 PM »
One very interesting and somewhat noteworthy feature to cite is the melting of this lake on Ellesmere Island. ...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Hazen notes:  "The area around the lake is a thermal oasis within a polar desert, with summer temperatures up to 20 °C (68 °F)."   Wonder what it's been like there the last few weeks.
"When the melt ponds drain apparent compaction goes up because the satellite sees ice, not water in ponds." - FOoW

uniquorn

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2862 on: July 15, 2020, 10:00:40 PM »
Big ice floes appeared north of Greenland today.  :o
That's 4 big lift off's in 4 days
https://go.nasa.gov/32sHmbM, jul10-15

weatherdude88

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2863 on: July 15, 2020, 10:24:30 PM »
It seems that the discussion from now on will be if 2020 will be "just?" 2nd lowest or it is able to become the lowest on record.

The Slater 50 day probabilistic sea ice extent forecast is not quite at the average date for northern hemisphere sea ice extent minimum (September 2nd). The model is showing a potential 10th place finish for NSIDC sea ice extent.


uniquorn

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2864 on: July 15, 2020, 10:28:56 PM »
Update on 6 whoi itp buoys in the Beaufort. The charts show data from 6m depth, so some way below most of the ice. Temperature is rising on all of them. Some more than others.

pearscot

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2865 on: July 15, 2020, 10:31:15 PM »
One very interesting and somewhat noteworthy feature to cite is the melting of this lake on Ellesmere Island. ...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Hazen notes:  "The area around the lake is a thermal oasis within a polar desert, with summer temperatures up to 20 °C (68 °F)."   Wonder what it's been like there the last few weeks.

Oh interesting, I never knew the name of it. Quite remarkable it gets so warm there...I've been looking at that region a lot and I suspect the growing amount of bare earth there helps to amplify the temperatures. It still must take an awful lot of energy to melt the ice on that lake.
pls!

OffTheGrid

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2866 on: July 15, 2020, 10:42:02 PM »
Hycoms concentration plummeting from ESS, through centre of Chukchi and Beaufort to mckenzie delta. Right now decent fetch winds hitting the laptev ice front with warm ssta and over 2.6m waves. Pity nullschool cuts off waves nth of 77deg, probably bigger at the ice edge. click to animate Hycom.
Edit: Euro has 3.5 m further out. Windy clipping further nth.
« Last Edit: July 15, 2020, 10:51:20 PM by OffTheGrid »

bbr2315

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2867 on: July 15, 2020, 10:49:36 PM »
It seems that the discussion from now on will be if 2020 will be "just?" 2nd lowest or it is able to become the lowest on record.

The Slater 50 day probabilistic sea ice extent forecast is not quite at the average date for northern hemisphere sea ice extent minimum (September 2nd). The model is showing a potential 10th place finish for NSIDC sea ice extent.


Naturally it is wxdude who posts a random #10 finish when extent is hundreds of K KM^2 ahead of any other year. lol.
« Last Edit: July 15, 2020, 10:55:25 PM by oren »

Michael Hauber

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2868 on: July 15, 2020, 11:19:53 PM »
EC and GFS seem to agree that the high pressure dominance will end at day 7, which is within a day or two of when high pressure dominance ended in 2011.  I think the current year vs the current record 2012 is worse than 2011 vs 2007.  But 2012 had a big surge in August.  I think beating 2012 will depend critically on August weather.

GFS shows a weak low which is perfect conditions to slow the melt down.  EC shows a strong low, which will cause a lot of dispersion, but I don't think it will be as damaging as some people expect unless it can be followed up by sunshine to pour heat into the gaps between the floes that are opened up.  The 2012 event was preceded by nearly a month of substantial dispersion with a fair bit of sunshine following low pressure dispersion in late June. 

My guess on the state of the central pack is that it is unusually compact.  The small holes seem to open up or close with little rhyme or reason, and no significant progression, except to run ahead of the rapidly receding boundary by a small distance.  My guess is that with substantial compaction and melting the ice floes break down but then stack on top of each other.  Melting is throughout the pack but the main loss of ice is at the edges as the central pack is replenished by ice being pushed in from the fringes.  Anywhere the ice becomes thin it gets pushed together and stacked on top of each other to maintain thickness.  My thinking on this is influenced by the phenomena of ice shoves, which is an interesting topic to google if you haven't heard of it before.
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Frivolousz21

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2869 on: July 15, 2020, 11:36:52 PM »
Can you please provide evidence of ice stacking on top of ot self to maintain thickness???

Pressure ridges are all over but they are only a few meters wide.

Its truly astonishing how many different excuses you guys are coming up with to rationalize away the most prolific warmth(May-present) we have every seen in the arctic basin and the decimation its caused.

This idea that the ice is super compact is a joke that you can visibly dispel on worldview.



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be cause

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2870 on: July 15, 2020, 11:51:38 PM »
OffTheGrid's hycom conc. gif shows a model taking the state of the ice into account . https://forum.arctic-sea-ice.net/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=3017.0;attach=275362;image

the brown and grey post melt pond ice is not stacking .. it is lacking the capacity do do more than collapse . The N. Kara ice vanished in a week . It stacked itself as a liquid . Ice trying to exit ESS is doing the same .
At the same time I do see compaction in action ( surely the wrong way round .. ) but .. there are 9 weeks left to minimum and we know already the next one is bad for the ice and the one after may be worse .
 I just wonder how big 2020's lead will be come season's end . To only be second would already fairly count as a miracle .
  This year the ice to me is like a punch-drunk boxer has been blinded and he doesn't even know  there's 2 opponents in the ring .
  Can the bell save him again ?
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« Last Edit: July 16, 2020, 12:17:12 AM by be cause »
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ajouis

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2871 on: July 15, 2020, 11:59:26 PM »
Hycoms concentration plummeting from ESS, through centre of Chukchi and Beaufort to mckenzie delta. Right now decent fetch winds hitting the laptev ice front with warm ssta and over 2.6m waves. Pity nullschool cuts off waves nth of 77deg, probably bigger at the ice edge. click to animate Hycom.
Edit: Euro has 3.5 m further out. Windy clipping further nth.
I would suggest that the  wave height would probably drop once its reached the deeper parts of the basin, although the layering could create a form of homeostasis
After a thousand steps on the ice, it cracked.
The Man looked down at the infinite blue of the sea.
On the horizon, standing still, the polar bear had just scented his next meal.

 Less than 3000 cubic kilometers this Piomas minimum.

wdmn

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2872 on: July 16, 2020, 12:09:27 AM »
Anywhere the ice becomes thin it gets pushed together and stacked on top of each other to maintain thickness.  My thinking on this is influenced by the phenomena of ice shoves, which is an interesting topic to google if you haven't heard of it before.

Things are obviously different in the Arctic, but my experience with ice shoves (on the Great Lakes, particularly Superior) is that they form during freeze events, but not during melt events. I've never seen melting ice pile up, even during extreme weather events. At most I've seen already established ridges (many metres thick) gain a bit of height (very little compared to their thickness) as layers of broken up ice are splashed over top by large waves.

Viggy

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2873 on: July 16, 2020, 12:11:26 AM »
EC and GFS seem to agree that the high pressure dominance will end at day 7, which is within a day or two of when high pressure dominance ended in 2011. 

So, we have been following along on this extreme high pressure regime since it started in late June/early July. And if I recall correctly, the models have quite often tried to dissipate it in the 5-10 day range only for the HP to persist without change.

Does anyone have data they can provide as to how accurate the models have been past day 5 in hindsight?

I ask because I've noticed a continuous trend to downplay the current events (as Friv noted) based on single model runs that are too far out to be reliable. The next 5 days on the Euro and GFS are mostly in agreement as to there being a persistent HP that slightly expands and moves towards the Beaufort/Chukchi  on day 4-5. That implies to me that this current event will continue without a major pause.

ajouis

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2874 on: July 16, 2020, 12:21:15 AM »
arctic melt, I meant 2020 in comparison to 2011

Have you seen the 2011 map of July 14th? The ice boundary in the Kara and Barents Sea is almost equal to today's. A little more ice is only in the Laptev Sea. This year is unique only on the Siberian side.

https://twitter.com/AlaskaWx/status/1283078129787957249

Quote
From @NSIDC Sea Ice Index v3, here are the regional #seaice extent rankings (since 1979) on July 13, 2020, 1=lowest, 42 highest. Impact of multi-month Siberian warmth is obvious. Only the Beaufort Sea and Hudson Bay are even close to average. #akwx #Arctic @Climatologist49 @ZLabe


No, the atlantification is much more pronounced and the caa is much more melted, look at the various years, there is no real copy between two years, no matter the weather conditions (in recent years obviously not the 80s)
After a thousand steps on the ice, it cracked.
The Man looked down at the infinite blue of the sea.
On the horizon, standing still, the polar bear had just scented his next meal.

 Less than 3000 cubic kilometers this Piomas minimum.

FishOutofWater

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2875 on: July 16, 2020, 12:53:29 AM »
The last ECMWF 5 day forecast that validated at 12z today was excellent for the Arctic.  It was high on the below normal pressures across the NH tropics. The ECMWF has done well in predicting the Arctic weather 5 days out, in my opinion. There are ways to review the verification but they are off topic here.

The weather models are not where the problems and issues are this melting season.

Frivolousz21

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2876 on: July 16, 2020, 03:25:13 AM »
Its very likely that we will see cyclogenesis over the arctic basin at some point during the last part of July or early August.

There are powerful  ingredients aligning  that can come together and cause a major BOMBOGENESIS event over the arctic basin.

While having a stark contrast of cold ice next to relatively warm water next to relatively warm land can aid in cyclogenesis, moisture transport, low level lift from warm moist air(relative) going perpendicular into the cold low levels over the ice.  Most of the time there is a low level atmospheric cap in place over the ice between 850-950mb since three warm mid  level air sits on top of the natural atmospheric refrigerator which is the floating ice sheet. 

But sometimes when the large ANTICYCLONE is starting to break down colder air can become displaced back over the ice while a separate surge of warm moist air  that originates in the mid latitudes is brought into the basin by the previous now dying flow between the ANTICYCLONE and unorganized vortex. 

This can lead to a low level flow between 800mb and 950mb with  air  penetrating the arctic ocean that's 10C(800mb) to near 20C(950mb).

If things align just right you can get a warm pulse from NW territory or Siberia that comes right off the land early in the day and punches straight into the cold pool.  Timing is crucial because diurnal heating can bring a near surface(1000 feet and down)  bubble of air that warms up into the 25-33C range as it quickly rises and gets turbo charged towards the ice by the low level jet. 

Of course this moist warm air will start cooling.   

However this air will already be lifting off the ground by the time it starts intersecting the established cold pool.  The air will be well off the ground rising while caught in the low level jet.

This ermac will continue to rise as it intersects the cold bubble sitting over the ice.  you can imagine even though this air will be modifying as it lifts into the mid levels over the ice that the temperature and moisture gradient is tremendous having that kind of heat rise over the cold air.

This will help initiate tremendous lift.  And if there's already vorticity in the area intersecting this.

Things will f****** pop off.  The Arctic is kind of special because the jet stream can meander and intersects itself not only in a dual position but a tri position.

Over the Eastern continental United States and Canada.  We see storm systems merge all the time but sometimes the tropical jet meats the southern branch of the polar jet which may have broken in the two as it reached the western coast of North America.  So all three jets meet each other over the eastern part of North America all bringing with it moisture and atmospheric VORTICITY.

With the southern jet bringing tropical moisture feed into this trifecta. 

We call it a triple point phase.  This is how the March 1993 superstorm formed. 

these conditions in the arctic while not having near the amount of heat and moisture the subtropics can provide even in winter can come together rather easily because of the small area that is the top of the Earth.

it seems to me that the main limiting factor in terms of bringing deep moisture into the Arctic is heat displacement.  The Sun is never going to be strong enough to bring tropical conditions or even mid latitude conditions.

Even if there was opening water between 60 and 70 North straight from jump in May during the melt season.  even if that area just happened to have a major ridge high practice it over it for May and June with mostly sunny skies 90% of the time the amount of heat that would be collected into that area of water would still be very limited.  While the surface theoretically to warm to say 15 maybe even 20 degrees Celsius.   The depth at which that heat would accumulate would be very shallow. 

This is something that could only really be overcome by very warm water coming in from the South.

This is where an area like the Barents can change from a sub Arctic ocean to a mid latitude ocean permenantely once the level of heat in the warm water conveyor belt is consistently warm enough to overcome the natural cooling from the solar minimum.

At some point once the warm water current is ready for the transformation of the barents.  We will likely need to see a spring to Summer event where a large ridge of high pressure sits in the right position over the barents long enough to add a level of heat through depth that matches the heat in the current so that new ocean currents become established that allow the warm conveyor belt to press further north instead of being submerged. 

Once this new normal is established the natural cooling from the solar minimum may not be enough to overcome the new normal and stunt the warm conveyor belt back to previous norms.


This taking place would be a game changer because you would have the cold Arctic and sea ice always forming along the losomov(mis spell) valley around the 81-83° latitude range.

So there would be ice there every Spring and early summer.  Even tho right next to the ice and cold pool a warm Barents sea in late Spring and Summer will exist harboring 10-20C water temps even through depth.

Imagine powerful mid level cyclones forming in August-November and tracking along the boundary between the barents and deep cold Arctic ocean.

Imagine a massive polar vortex breaking off the ENA area and migrating down that path.  Tapping into those 10-15C SSTs in November or December.

That polar vortex would aquire a warm pool and could under go extreme cyclogenesis.  Not always as a small compact system but a major mid latitude cyclone displaced North that has a deep warm moist sector of 10-15C SSTs and deep cold air ranging -20 to -30C.  While these airmasses collide around Svalbard.

And an unprecedented extreme cases this system would intersect a powerful piece of VORTICITY in the polar jet.

The result could be storms at depth, size, and power we have never seen as humans.

Trying to push sub 900mb.

Bringing 75-115KT sustainable winds over huge parts of the Arctic.

Bringing massive swells and waves along a 2000 mile fetch slamming INTO Atlantic side ice.

Anyways I have ranted to long.
« Last Edit: July 16, 2020, 04:14:25 AM by Frivolousz21 »
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Paul

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2877 on: July 16, 2020, 03:29:47 AM »
Can you please provide evidence of ice stacking on top of ot self to maintain thickness???

Pressure ridges are all over but they are only a few meters wide.

Its truly astonishing how many different excuses you guys are coming up with to rationalize away the most prolific warmth(May-present) we have every seen in the arctic basin and the decimation its caused.

This idea that the ice is super compact is a joke that you can visibly dispel on worldview.

Just because an ice cover may be compact, it does not mean its thick and I got to say looking at worldview, it really does not look thick but dispersion compare to say 2016 is alot less but so is extent. I always say, dispersion hurts the ice more in the longer term than the shorter term if the conditions are right. There is a good reason why so much extent was lost in 2012 when that storm hit, it was because the ice was dispersed, full of holes and the storm hit in just the right area to split a large chunk of the ice pack and melt it away.

I must say though, given how low extent is and the warm SSTS, maybe the damage is done already?

D-Penguin

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2878 on: July 16, 2020, 04:19:25 AM »
RE[ The 2020 Melting Season

As we see more heat accumulate in the Indian Ocean and this is transported northwards, more snows fall in the high Himalayas, dragging down the snow line, and INCREASING the efficiency of the heat transport as we head deeper into the year. Basically, as we see more snow linger in high elevations and low latitudes, the enhanced baroclinic gradient is going to send more and more of the surrounding continental and oceanic heat (ever-more amplified by our ever-rising GHGs) northward into the primary polar cell, ultimately destroying it earlier and earlier each and every year. The other anomalous patches of continental snowfall in North America are having the same impact, IMO, and while the impact shifts regionally year over year it is now seemingly WORSENING as a whole which is becoming a driving contributor to Arctic amplification. "

"What starts outside of the Arctic does not stay outside of the Arctic."

IMVHO this posting by bbr2315 is the most significant posting made on this excellent Forum and absolutely belongs to this thread. (Oren - I do not agree with your opinion about the 'appropriateness' for the posting by bbr2315 in the 2020 Melting Season thread but thank goodness you decided to exercise your usual sound 'good judgement' and allowed it to stand.)

The succinct explanation provided for the exceptional weather during the current period of the 2020 Melting Season is not about 'snow' but it is about the 'Arctic Polar Vortex', its demise and the response of Arctic ice to the Arctic weather systems so created. 2020 is the first year to demonstrate so clearly that relationship between the Arctic ice and the Arctic Polar Vortex.

I do not see how the current melting season or any future melting season can be adequately discussed without reference to the Arctic Polar Vortex and its effect upon the Arctic weather systems that prevail at the time. How often do postings end 'but...it all depends on the weather'? The question is, what does the weather depend upon?

To misquote Bill Clinton's famous Presidential campaign slogan 'It's all about the Arctic Polar Vortex you dummy!'
Remember...it's all about the Jet Stream you dummy...just a personal reminder!

D-Penguin

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2879 on: July 16, 2020, 04:33:11 AM »
Its very likely that we will see cyclogenesis over the arctic basin at some point during the last part of July or early August.

Anyways I have ranted to long.

I had not read your posting before I posted mine.

IMO your posting is not a 'rant', it is absolutely relevant to the debate! Your knowledge applied to the current status of the Arctic Polar Vortex would provide the most valuable insight to what might be expected  over discreet periods of time during the melting season. Priceless! Thank you for the intuitive leap based on the science.
Remember...it's all about the Jet Stream you dummy...just a personal reminder!

Phoenix

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2880 on: July 16, 2020, 05:40:58 AM »

Note the outgoing longwave radiation anomaly over the pole in the NOAA Physical Science Lab map. This map indicates clear skies and above normal incoming and outgoing radiation and by difference less cloud-reflected solar radiation than normal. This map shows that our inference, from the weather patterns, that more solar radiation than normal is reaching the surface is a good one.

Trying to understand this FOOW. I see a map with outgoing longwave radiation anomaly which is +10-30 W/ m2 over a lot of the Arctic.

Incoming solar radiation is short wave. It is either absorbed at the surface (used to melt ice or converted to long wave which heats the water, land and atmosphere) or reflected back to space as short-wave radiation.

A positive OLR anomaly seems to be an indicator of an Arctic region emitting more heat than usual which would seem to be a positive influence on sea ice outcome. I don't see how one can conclude that the Arctic is receiving more incoming short-wave (solar) radiation in a given time interval from a measurement of outgoing long-wave radiation over that same time interval. The timing isn't necessarily matched. If there were measures of incoming and outgoing short wave radiation, that would shed more light on the situation (no pun intended).

My simple understanding is that a negative OLR anomaly might be worse because it means more energy is remaining in the Arctic to perform heating and melting work.

Trying to learn via participation here.

Sublime_Rime

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2881 on: July 16, 2020, 06:01:49 AM »
The result could be storms at depth, size, and power we have never seen as humans.

Trying to push sub 900mb.

Bringing 75-115KT sustainable winds over huge parts of the Arctic.

Bringing massive swells and waves along a 2000 mile fetch slamming INTO Atlantic side ice.

Sounds pretty cinematic Friv, maybe we could collaborate on a film script sometime soon. I mean, not like today, but maybe tomorrow... or the day after.
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D-Penguin

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2882 on: July 16, 2020, 06:13:52 AM »
The result could be storms at depth, size, and power we have never seen as humans.

Trying to push sub 900mb.

Bringing 75-115KT sustainable winds over huge parts of the Arctic.

Bringing massive swells and waves along a 2000 mile fetch slamming INTO Atlantic side ice.

Sounds pretty cinematic Friv, maybe we could collaborate on a film script sometime soon. I mean, not like today, but maybe tomorrow... or the day after.

Why not wait until it happens (we won't have to wait too long) and then you can turn your creative cinematic aspirations into a horror movie perhaps.
Remember...it's all about the Jet Stream you dummy...just a personal reminder!

Aluminium

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2883 on: July 16, 2020, 06:23:12 AM »
July 1-15 (fast).

oren

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2884 on: July 16, 2020, 06:24:48 AM »
While strong 3D melt continues under the clear skies and low albedo, in 2D we have a tale of two different Arctics, thanks in part to very strong drift patterns. The Laptev is the poster child of this year's heat, racing to zero and currently two weeks ahead of its nearest competitor since 2012. Meanwhile, the Beaufort is dragging its feet and is almost highest in the AMSR2 record.
Despite the compaction pulling the ice into the center, the CAB area has taken a disturbing turn for the worse.
PIOMAS volume for mid-July should be out in 2-3 days. I expect record volume loss in the CAB for the period. Will it translate to crazy area losses later on? We shall see.

ajouis

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2885 on: July 16, 2020, 06:37:08 AM »
The last ECMWF 5 day forecast that validated at 12z today was excellent for the Arctic.  It was high on the below normal pressures across the NH tropics. The ECMWF has done well in predicting the Arctic weather 5 days out, in my opinion. There are ways to review the verification but they are off topic here.

The weather models are not where the problems and issues are this melting season.
I would have said that the continued high arctic high is bad for the ice, why do you think it is a good forecast for ice retention?
After a thousand steps on the ice, it cracked.
The Man looked down at the infinite blue of the sea.
On the horizon, standing still, the polar bear had just scented his next meal.

 Less than 3000 cubic kilometers this Piomas minimum.

bbr2315

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2886 on: July 16, 2020, 06:40:32 AM »
The last ECMWF 5 day forecast that validated at 12z today was excellent for the Arctic.  It was high on the below normal pressures across the NH tropics. The ECMWF has done well in predicting the Arctic weather 5 days out, in my opinion. There are ways to review the verification but they are off topic here.

The weather models are not where the problems and issues are this melting season.
I would have said that the continued high arctic high is bad for the ice, why do you think it is a good forecast for ice retention?
He is saying the forecast itself from the EURO verified excellently. I would agree. The EURO is normally best.

tzupancic

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2887 on: July 16, 2020, 06:40:41 AM »
Can concentrated ice melt like dispersed ice? Did early season preconditioning matter? Did solar insulation in July have an effect? What will happen next?

ajouis

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2888 on: July 16, 2020, 06:49:16 AM »
Oh ok, cheers
After a thousand steps on the ice, it cracked.
The Man looked down at the infinite blue of the sea.
On the horizon, standing still, the polar bear had just scented his next meal.

 Less than 3000 cubic kilometers this Piomas minimum.

Glen Koehler

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2889 on: July 16, 2020, 06:56:04 AM »
Meanwhile, the Beaufort is dragging its feet and is almost highest in the AMSR2 record..
     The July 22 HYCOM thickness forecast posted by Milwen at
https://forum.arctic-sea-ice.net/index.php/topic,3017.msg274198.html#msg274198
and the HYCOM concentration forecast posted by OfftheGrid at
https://forum.arctic-sea-ice.net/index.php/topic,3017.msg274287.html#msg274287
both indicate that the Beaufort is unlikely to serve as a defensive wall for much longer, as it is beginning its own period of rapid retreat.



« Last Edit: July 16, 2020, 07:03:15 AM by Glen Koehler »
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jdallen

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2890 on: July 16, 2020, 06:58:36 AM »
Friv, from Tidbits I "only" see the bombcyclone down to 972 hpa.

That's quite bad enough, especially if there is still a strong dome elsewhere on the Atlantic side creating an extreme gradient.

55-60 HPA gradient across the central basin will shove a lot of ice around in unpleasant ways.
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bbr2315

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2891 on: July 16, 2020, 07:03:01 AM »
Meanwhile, the Beaufort is dragging its feet and is almost highest in the AMSR2 record..
     The HYCOM forecast posted by Milwen at
https://forum.arctic-sea-ice.net/index.php/topic,3017.msg274198.html#msg274198
indicates that the Beaufort is unlikely to serve as a defensive wall for much longer, as it is beginning its own period of rapid retreat.


The 12z EURO agrees with HYCOM re: concentration plunge / dispersion / melting in Beaufort. At the same time the same occurs across the entire ATL front.

I am very worried about what is going to happen if we have open water over a wide portion of the deep-ocean Arctic. I do believe that unlike the shallow seas there is the potential for CAB to take much longer to rebound due to its depth if this event does occur over a wide area.

GoSouthYoungins

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2892 on: July 16, 2020, 07:06:31 AM »
Why not wait until it happens (we won't have to wait too long) and then you can turn your creative cinematic aspirations into a horror movie perhaps.

There won't be anyone to watch it. Prediction is all we will ever have.
big time oops

jdallen

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2893 on: July 16, 2020, 07:07:02 AM »
<snippage>
I would suggest that the  wave height would probably drop once its reached the deeper parts of the basin, although the layering could create a form of homeostasis
Nope.  If anything deeper water will produce *larger* waves.

What manner of "layering" are you talking about?  High wind is always hugely disruptive to the water column.  It won't cause any kind of layering.
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Glen Koehler

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2894 on: July 16, 2020, 07:08:21 AM »
     It looks like soon all the ice abutting continental coasts and major islands will be melted out.
How much difference does that make to Arctic-wide ice pack rotation? 
Does that free up the pack to rotate faster with consequences for transport into Barents, Fram Strait,  ESS, and Laptev melting zones, with possible addition of Ekman uplift of warmer subsurface water?
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jdallen

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2895 on: July 16, 2020, 07:15:55 AM »
<snippage>
Trying to understand this FOOW. I see a map with outgoing longwave radiation anomaly which is +10-30 W/ m2 over a lot of the Arctic.

Incoming solar radiation is short wave. It is either absorbed at the surface (used to melt ice or converted to long wave which heats the water, land and atmosphere) or reflected back to space as short-wave radiation.

A positive OLR anomaly seems to be an indicator of an Arctic region emitting more heat than usual...
<snippage>

What that anomaly suggests is that there is more heat at the surface to support that long wave emission anomaly. 

Long wave is energy which has been captured and is being re-released as black body radiation. It's not reflected.  It won't be increasing unless the surface emitting it has gotten hotter.

There's no way it indicates something helpful for the ices.  Rather, it indicates the melt season heat budget is flush with exceptional surplus energy.
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Killian

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2896 on: July 16, 2020, 07:25:08 AM »
I was looking at JAXA ASI Extent and a pattern caught my eye. (I know there is data essentially showing this, but I'm more visual and prefer patterns to data sets and numbers.) Essentially, what is happening in the first half of July keeps happening through mid- to late August. The exceptions are not dramatic.

If 2020 holds the pattern...

Phoenix

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2897 on: July 16, 2020, 07:36:07 AM »

A positive OLR anomaly seems to be an indicator of an Arctic region emitting more heat than usual...


What that anomaly suggests is that there is more heat at the surface to support that long wave emission anomaly. 

Long wave is energy which has been captured and is being re-released as black body radiation. It's not reflected.  It won't be increasing unless the surface emitting it has gotten hotter.

There's no way it indicates something helpful for the ices.  Rather, it indicates the melt season heat budget is flush with exceptional surplus energy.

What would we expect to see in the OLR anomaly chart if the Arctic surface cooled more than normal? Would we expect a positive, negative or neutral OLR anomaly?

Arctic 2m temperatures have been declining in the last week and the regional surface temperature anomaly is close to 0C per GFS after 7 months of being off the charts.

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2898 on: July 16, 2020, 07:48:34 AM »
If 2020 holds the pattern...

Do you have an estimate where that projection would land us towards the end of the melt season? Does it dip sub 3.00? Would also be cool to see a metric of how closely previous years follow the trend! (Though idk if that is more work than it is worth)

ajouis

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Re: The 2020 melting season
« Reply #2899 on: July 16, 2020, 08:16:34 AM »
<snippage>
I would suggest that the  wave height would probably drop once its reached the deeper parts of the basin, although the layering could create a form of homeostasis
Nope.  If anything deeper water will produce *larger* waves.

What manner of "layering" are you talking about?  High wind is always hugely disruptive to the water column.  It won't cause any kind of layering.
If going to a shallow area produces higher waves, is what I extrapolated from, if you have a source on the opposite claim it is more than welcome. Even high wind can do mixing at depth, so at least some form of layer will remain, in deep waters.
After a thousand steps on the ice, it cracked.
The Man looked down at the infinite blue of the sea.
On the horizon, standing still, the polar bear had just scented his next meal.

 Less than 3000 cubic kilometers this Piomas minimum.