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RoxTheGeologist

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4150 on: August 19, 2016, 05:33:29 PM »
...
Any ideas why the discrepancy?
Isn't it obvious? He compares _extent_ numbers to _area_ numbers. Like if it's same thing. It's not. And it's not. ;)

It's often best to read the graph title and axis labels ;).

Nightvid Cole

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4151 on: August 19, 2016, 05:47:12 PM »
...
Any ideas why the discrepancy?
Isn't it obvious? He compares _extent_ numbers to _area_ numbers. Like if it's same thing. It's not. And it's not. ;)

The question is why the 4km resolution for MASIE doesn't allow the extent numbers to be affected by all the open water areas that are in the interior of the ice pack. Or at least it's my question. If the grid cell size is small enough, eventually extent and area should be similar to each other, right?

jdallen

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4152 on: August 19, 2016, 05:49:30 PM »
Wow with all this ocean rotation going on, may I suggest an alternate name for this phenomenon; The Maelstrom. :)
Actually, rather apt.
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Tor Bejnar

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4153 on: August 19, 2016, 05:58:01 PM »
Actually, BFTV presented two graphs of extent, one for CAB and the other for the Northern Hemisphere. 

But I don't understand why the NSICD/NIC MASIE CAB extent graph, for example, shows 2013 as having low extent when the ASIG 'Regional Graphs' CAB extent graph shows that 2013 extent is relatively high.
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JimboOmega

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4154 on: August 19, 2016, 05:59:54 PM »
I have to ask: How much percentage of the destruction(of the minimum in september) is carried to the next summer? I mean does a huge minimum mean anything for the next melt season or a relatively good/cold winter can replace the loss easily?

On the subject of cyclones - I wonder if the arctic is "unique" because of the ice.  An ice covered arctic in the summer is, at the surface, pretty uniformly at 0C-ish.  Uniformity means no thermodynamic energy for cyclones. But in a year like this where the waters near the arctic are so anomalously warm, that means a sharp gradient (Between ice and not ice), so lots of energy for cyclones there?

Anyway, I was pondering your question back in May/June, when 2016 was so far ahead.  In years past "most" of the ice regenerates in the winter - though the fact that it's all first year ice and not as thick does make it a little more vulnerable the next summer. The thing to remember is that open water loses heat much more rapidly, so there's some pull back towards "normal". Also, across the arctic, the ice melt is occurring "on the margin" - that is, there's a little less ice or a little more ice, but the whole system is still near freezing once the sun sets for the year in a month or so.  The water itself isn't getting much warmer than that so there isn't really much delay before it can freeze.

My theory is that there will be a tipping point where arctic water itself starts to absorb more heat (not just the ice) and freezing becomes delayed, and that will have much bigger and more noticeable effects.

Oh and to bring it back to this year... as much as I've been a fan of lower values... I don't think this year is such a tipping point. But I haven't looked at say, the Barrow Sea, which opened way early and stayed open all summer and soaked up all of those glorious solar rays from before solstice until now. I've never payed attention much to freezing season, but this year I might.

BornFromTheVoid

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4155 on: August 19, 2016, 06:02:33 PM »
Isn't it obvious? He compares _extent_ numbers to _area_ numbers. Like if it's same thing. It's not. And it's not. ;)

I thought pointing out that it is a "very different measure" might have made it clear that I wasn't comparing like with like. Will try be more clear next time!

Nevertheless, the discrepancies are interesting.
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Archimid

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4156 on: August 19, 2016, 06:41:45 PM »

I have to ask: How much percentage of the destruction(of the minimum in september) is carried to the next summer? I mean does a huge minimum mean anything for the next melt season or a relatively good/cold winter can replace the loss easily?

I think ice age gives good intuition of how much destruction is carried over.
I am an energy reservoir seemingly intent on lowering entropy for self preservation.

AbruptSLR

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4157 on: August 19, 2016, 06:47:16 PM »
Scribbler has a nice article today on our current Arctic storm, entitled: "Warm Arctic Storm Tearing Sea Ice to Shreds amidst Big 2016 Heat Spike":

https://robertscribbler.com/2016/08/18/warm-arctic-storm-tearing-sea-ice-to-shreds-amidst-big-2016-heat-spike/
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The Hundredth Monkey

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4158 on: August 19, 2016, 06:49:58 PM »
If 2016 ends up like 2012 from a minimum and GAC standpoint, I have another data point to use as another potential proxy predictor.  Or it's just coincidental.  who knows. 

Minnesota Mosquitoes in March.

I live in Minnesota, and while this isn't snow depth in Siberia (though depending on who you ask, some people think of Minnesota as Siberia), I have only seen mosquitoes in March in Minnesota twice in my life time.  2012 and again this year. 
Both years had extraordinary heat early in the year, and were anomalously unseasonable. 

Until recently, March had been the snowiest month in Minnesota.  Now it's January, as we get more rain in March now. 
This year I'm sure its just global warming with el nino on top, but it's eerie how similar this year is tracking to 2012 in some ways, even outside the arctic. 
 

AbruptSLR

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4159 on: August 19, 2016, 07:09:26 PM »
Per the attached image Nullschool has the central pressure for the storm today (Aug 19) down to 975 hPa:

Edit: The second image shows that later in the day the pressure dropped to 973 hPa
« Last Edit: August 20, 2016, 12:50:38 AM by AbruptSLR »
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bbr2314

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4160 on: August 19, 2016, 07:22:12 PM »
i guess one would call this a die-pole??? as in mother nature is telling the north pole's ice to die very quickly




bbr2314

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4161 on: August 19, 2016, 07:26:10 PM »
nothing like a closed 582DM heat ridge over the Arctic as you enter September...



GFS pushes the ridging up to 585DM(!!!!) after D10, obviously unreliable on its own but with support from CMC... this would be simply unprecedented i think???



« Last Edit: August 19, 2016, 07:37:34 PM by bbr2314 »

jdallen

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4162 on: August 19, 2016, 08:22:56 PM »
<snippage>
GFS pushes the ridging up to 585DM(!!!!) after D10, obviously unreliable on its own but with support from CMC... this would be simply unprecedented i think???
<snippage>
I have no sense of that historically.  What I think we can say is, the current cyclones combined with the current state of the ice *is* unprecedented, and all bets regarding the outcome of the melt season are now off.
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Lord M Vader

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4163 on: August 19, 2016, 08:46:42 PM »
If the forecasts come true, I think everyone here will be grateful that this is late August and not sunstice.... It would have been a complete massacre!

BornFromTheVoid

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4164 on: August 19, 2016, 08:56:49 PM »
I dunno, LMV. These strong winds that are forecast, with regard to compaction and transport through Fram, will have their strongest effect now that the ice is at it's most fragmented.
The broken pieces will be more easily pushed along by the winds than a more solid pack from earlier in the season, not to mention the waves and swells now being able to act across the vast majority of the  Arctic ocean; lapping onto the remaining ice and churning up warmer waters.

At this time of year we'd expect the cooler air temps to start counteracting the warmer oceans and quickly reduce the melt rate. But there's now strong agreement that almost all the cold air that's built up around the cyclone will be flushed out with the dipole too. So we have the double whammy of the cold getting pushed out of the Arctic just after the upper ocean has been churned up and warmed. This should increase the chance of sustained moderate to high melt rates though the early September at least.

EDIT: That's not to say that beating 2012 is likely, as even record breaking melt from now to minimum wouldn't necessarily be enough. But it definitely increases the chances catching 2012 during September.
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nowayout

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4165 on: August 19, 2016, 09:22:20 PM »
If the forecasts come true, I think everyone here will be grateful that this is late August and not solstice.... It would have been a complete massacre!

It will be "a complete massacre" a few years from now, and you know, and we know.

Weep, as long as you can.
 :(

Greenbelt

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4166 on: August 19, 2016, 09:24:13 PM »
Pretty interesting weather forecast. Deep low at the Atlantic edge might be as much or more of an ice killer than time of year than the predicted sun in the Beaufort?

jdallen

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4167 on: August 19, 2016, 09:56:54 PM »
Pretty interesting weather forecast. Deep low at the Atlantic edge might be as much or more of an ice killer than time of year than the predicted sun in the Beaufort?

With the ice as it is in its current state, there is *no* safe place for this/these cyclone(s) to land. 

I'm not sure sunlight would make that much of a difference, as we're tapping into the huge reservoir of heat in the Arctic ocean at depth.  There's months if not years of stored energy in there.

Currently, the cloudiness might actually be capturing *more* insolation and delivering it to the ground than clear skies would, due to the low angle of the sun.

It's like nature is running an electric hand mixer around a bowl full of ice cubes.

[edit:  I anticipate several more century, possible close to double century, drops early next week if and when the storm re-intensifies.]
« Last Edit: August 19, 2016, 10:09:06 PM by jdallen »
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Lord M Vader

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4168 on: August 19, 2016, 09:57:59 PM »
Greenbelt, put that 954 hpa cyclone just north of Franz Josefs land and Novaya Severnaya and you will get some serious action!

jdallen

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4169 on: August 19, 2016, 10:11:09 PM »
Greenbelt, put that 954 hpa cyclone just north of Franz Josefs land and Novaya Severnaya and you will get some serious action!
Ask and ye shall receive; it looks like one - probably not at the 954 level but low enough - will be crossing through there out of the Kara some time next week.
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jplotinus

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4170 on: August 19, 2016, 10:54:29 PM »
Still more drift ice at Barrow at just after noon, local time today. Temp also hovering at and slightly below 0°C, too. One wonders whether that amount of drift ice will show up as +extent in the Beaufort sector?


Andreas T

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4171 on: August 19, 2016, 11:47:17 PM »
.....

Currently, the cloudiness might actually be capturing *more* insolation and delivering it to the ground than clear skies would, due to the low angle of the sun.
...
apart from a small area where a cloud might be exposed to sunlight through a gap, this is an impossibility for larger areas. Clouds can not scatter more light down than they receive on their top surface.

RoxTheGeologist

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4172 on: August 19, 2016, 11:51:03 PM »

They scatter more heat back to the earth than clear skies. Is the rate at which clouds prevent heat from leaving enough to balance what they absorb from above?

slow wing

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4173 on: August 20, 2016, 12:08:15 AM »
Strange how quickly one can become inured to these storms. As others have posted above, currently there is a powerful storm in the sea ice sanctuary off the Canadian Arctic coast.

Thanks for posting the pressure maps above. The GFS model shown in tropicaltidbids.com has its low pressure at 972 hPa, while their ECMWF has it at 975 hPa.

Here are the corresponding wind graphics from Nullschool (uses GFS) and Windyty (using the ECMWF option). The maximum current wind speeds I found at the storm were, respectively, 55 km/h (though more near the channel between the islands) and 34 kt = 63 km/h.

EDIT: Windyty.com shows the storm sweeping across the ice sanctuary over the rest of their 5-day prediction window - including growing larger.
HINT: click on the animation arrow at the bottom of their page to watch the storm develop. It's really well done. To get the Arctic display though, I had to enter "NORTH POLE" as location then zoom out 5 times.
« Last Edit: August 20, 2016, 12:56:52 AM by slow wing »

Crocodile23

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4174 on: August 20, 2016, 01:30:11 AM »
Pretty interesting weather forecast. Deep low at the Atlantic edge might be as much or more of an ice killer than time of year than the predicted sun in the Beaufort?

 If deep lows are ice killers then i wonder what a "deep high" with sunny weather can do. Of course it's just a GFS prediction of 8+ days so almost meaningless.
Pretty shocking prediction nonetheless after so many deep cyclones that have passed.



They scatter more heat back to the earth than clear skies. Is the rate at which clouds prevent heat from leaving enough to balance what they absorb from above?

Low clouds and cumulonimbus clouds have definitely negative impact to temperatures(cooling effect) as they don't allow most of the sunlight(energy) to reach the surface and they don't emmit that much longwave (coming from the surface) to the surface again.
High clouds have definitely positive impact to the temperatures(warming effect) as they allow almost all sunlight to pass through them and they emit most longwave radiation back to the surface again.
Middle level clouds have both characteristics of the above 2 types but on average they behave more like low level clouds in the net result of the energy.


jdallen

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4175 on: August 20, 2016, 01:31:52 AM »

They scatter more heat back to the earth than clear skies. Is the rate at which clouds prevent heat from leaving enough to balance what they absorb from above?
What I'm considering is that clouds would capture more energy, as with low sun angle, you'd see much of the light reflected back out of the atmosphere off of either sea or ice surface.  Long wave down-welling radiation re-emitted by clouds (a much larger surface area than the sea surface) would be "non-directional" and at some incidence angles might be greater than what would be picked up by direct insolation.

*Either* way, it would not be significant.  I'd be surprised if it balanced more than a small fraction of what's being tossed out of the top of the atmosphere.  Just another contribution to the heat bucket.

[edit:  a deep "High" in 8 days would accomplish very little, and would actually help the ice recover.  Incidence angles above about 75N are going to be low enough it's not going to capture enough sunlight to balance out outgoing radiation.  No clouds would mean nothing to hold down that outgoing radiation.]
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Darvince

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4176 on: August 20, 2016, 01:51:54 AM »
From here

that tooting is for several reasons:

a) the replies at that time were very offending and aggressive even though many things were obvious and show to be that now and did so before

b) there is a saying that as one shouts into the woods the echo comes back and considering this general wisdom
the tooting is quite moderate IMO, while i think it's absolutely necessary that some people remember in the future who is said what ( your own words and proposal ) and who has an "eye" for the bigger picture.

what counts is what is right, not who is right but then if some people are often spot on they should not be met with offending comments over and over again.
These offending comments simply didn't exist unless you're bbr2314 and got into an argument about HYCOM as a model, so I don't know what you're talking about. I've been following this forum closelsy for several months, and I've participated more when the atmosphere was less poisonous with all the putting down of other forum posters more recently (not mainly from you)

if this is about finding the most accurate predictions and facts it cannot be wrong to toot that horn from time to time. i for my part know exactly what i wrote and it came to happen over and over again and further will.
since i'm not a scientist perhaps is simple locic, observation and an open eye for the multitude of factors instead of concentrating on on model or another and build an opinion on weekly or even worse, daily numbers and events.
I don't really understand what you're trying to say here, because most of us don't tend to concentrate on a single model but rather do indeed look at the big picture and form our predictions based on that. And daily numbers aren't such a bad thing to look at when you understand why they are doing what they're doing because the sea ice is so greatly affected by the weather going on above it (as I bet everyone can most definitely see this week to an extreme).
Personally I'd like to see more explanation of the thought processes behind these predictions as that is far more interesting to me than simply declaring "we're going to lose a million km² of ice this week!" or "we're going to go ice free this september!"

i find it a interesting that when we were attacked for saying what is showing to be close now nobody felt
the need to take those statements into consideration but now interestingly some are very quick to
put another stamp again.

first one gets bashed for the bluntness to go agains the mainstream and then when it happens is bashed again
for remind the bashers that the tone at that time was not appropriate.
I'm pretty sure that no one (well, maybe one person) was able to accurately predict how this melting season would go weatherwise, with a hot late April and May, cool and cloudy June and July, and then strong storms to disperse and melt large amounts of ice in August. Whoever made a prediction that this season wouldn't continue its strong melting trend and then have a strong finish in May/April should get a pat on their back IMO.

And I later said it was splitting in three... I don't want to toot my horn but I have been pretty correct overall and the jury is still out re: 1M KM2 or less this yr (i.e ice-free).
For ice-free conditions:
Using current NSIDC numbers provided by Wipneus, from now until September 25 would require an average drop of 110742 km².
Using current IJIS numbers provided by Espen, from now until September 25 would require an average drop of 105677 km².

Unfortunately I can't calculate this for AMSR2 because I can't find the exact extent/area numbers for it.

Now while it does have a very slim chance of happening, the only reasonable way I could see this happening is if sub-970 lows continued to be churned out like it was nothing and then towards the end of the melting season a hurricane remnant (Hurricane Faith 1966 anyone?) entered the Arctic, bringing huge amounts of heat and wind with it.

Something like these
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurricane_Debbie_%281969%29
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2b/Faithinsertmap.png



[edit:  a deep "High" in 8 days would accomplish very little, and would actually help the ice recover.  Incidence angles above about 75N are going to be low enough it's not going to capture enough sunlight to balance out outgoing radiation.  No clouds would mean nothing to hold down that outgoing radiation.]
surface temperatures matter more than radiation balance (and above zero temperatures on this thin ice wouldn't help it very much) http://imgur.com/a/6MOa2
« Last Edit: August 20, 2016, 02:00:41 AM by Darvince »

budmantis

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4177 on: August 20, 2016, 05:31:25 AM »
And I later said it was splitting in three... I don't want to toot my horn but I have been pretty correct overall and the jury is still out re: 1M KM2 or less this yr (i.e ice-free).

Anyone who has watched the arctic over several years will say that reaching 1M KM2 this year is just not going to happen, (barring an apocalyptic level event). Most members on this blog agree that the ice is in terrible shape and given the right conditions, we could have been looking at 1M km2 next month. I have enjoyed some of your contributions and I hope you continue to contribute, however you cant take credit for being right when the results come from weather that no one could predict. My advice for you and Magnamentis would be to tone it down a bit and show a little humility.
« Last Edit: August 20, 2016, 05:45:49 AM by budmantis »

S.Pansa

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4178 on: August 20, 2016, 07:09:16 AM »
And I later said it was splitting in three... I don't want to toot my horn but I have been pretty correct overall and the jury is still out re: 1M KM2 or less this yr (i.e ice-free).

^Seconded. And thank you Neven for setting the kindergarten straight in the homebrew thread!

And has it split into three parts? Doesn't look like that to me.

http://www.iup.uni-bremen.de:8084/amsr2/Arctic_AMSR2_nic.png

And the jury is still out re 1M KM2? Yes, but only because we have mid August and not mid September yet.
NSICD extent is at 5.2 M KM2 right now. The minimum is about 4 weeks away. We would need a streak of 30 fat & big century brakes or more from now to come even close to 1M KM2. Do you really think this is going to happen? Because we haven't seen this in June, July and August so fare (if memory serves). What would that be? A 4,5,6 sigma event? (Unfortunately, I am too stupid to calculate that :-[ )
I mean, we'll get most probably some extraordinary weather in the coming days, but come on ... things are looking bad enough as they are but this is not even remotely likely.
And even if you want to go by Area, we'll have to lose about 2.6 M KM2 in the next 4 weeks. In a period where the potential for surface melt is vanishing quickly.
http://cires1.colorado.edu/~aslater/ARCTIC_TAIR/

But back on topic. Here is what TOPAZ4 thinks how the melt will proceed in the next 8 days.


Tigertown

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4179 on: August 20, 2016, 07:31:44 AM »
And I later said it was splitting in three... I don't want to toot my horn but I have been pretty correct overall and the jury is still out re: 1M KM2 or less this yr (i.e ice-free).

Anyone who has watched the arctic over several years will say that reaching 1M KM2 this year is just not going to happen, (barring an apocalyptic level event). Most members on this blog agree that the ice is in terrible shape and given the right conditions, we could have been looking at 1M km2 next month. I have enjoyed some of your contributions and I hope you continue to contribute, however you cant take credit for being right when the results come from weather that no one could predict. My advice for you and Magnamentis would be to tone it down a bit and show a little humility.

Now this is a good man that knows how to talk to other people. It is a lot easier to listen to someone like this. He is trying to help instead of attacking.
"....and the appointed time came for God to bring to ruin those ruining the earth." Revelation 11:18.

georged

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4180 on: August 20, 2016, 09:12:11 AM »
Extent may go below 4, but below 3 would require not just exceptional conditions, but exceptional and exceptionally sustained conditions.

Nevertheless, what we see in those images is shocking in and of itself.

effbeh

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4181 on: August 20, 2016, 09:12:30 AM »
Following the development in the JAXA SIE chart closely, it even seems increasingly unlikely that 2016 even is a new claimant to the throne. A rapid ice loss of the required magnitude at this time of the year would be unprecedented. Even taking outlier year 2012 into account.  The steepest extent drop happened in the first August decade then, and from this day to the minimum, 2012 lost just about another 1 mio km2.  The race between 2007, 2015 and 2016 seems to be still open.  Being at 4.97 mio km2 extent now, my guess at this point is that 2016 could still finish in 2nd position and be the second year with a less than 4 mio km2 minimum. 

On the other hand, eyeballing the visual state of the ice and the development of the thickness and concentration maps seems to suggest that a catastrophic extent loss is still within reach.  It isn't over until it's over and sometimes the unprecedented gets a precedent.

wallen

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4182 on: August 20, 2016, 09:52:40 AM »
A newbie who enjoys reading all the posts. I don't have expertise in the field, so will leave that to those who do. If other don't mind I may ask the occasional question( Hopefully in the right post).
That said I am curious about the following.
Given the conditions of the ice and the current and predicted weather patterns, there is a lot debating on how low the ice extent will go this year, but as to when.
Since the winter maximums appear to occurring earlier and are lower, what likely chance of this summer minimum  not happening til sometime in October.

budmantis

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4183 on: August 20, 2016, 10:02:37 AM »
Nevertheless, what we see in those images is shocking in and of itself.

Agreed.

seaicesailor

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4184 on: August 20, 2016, 11:19:28 AM »
A newbie who enjoys reading all the posts. I don't have expertise in the field, so will leave that to those who do. If other don't mind I may ask the occasional question( Hopefully in the right post).
That said I am curious about the following.
Given the conditions of the ice and the current and predicted weather patterns, there is a lot debating on how low the ice extent will go this year, but as to when.
Since the winter maximums appear to occurring earlier and are lower, what likely chance of this summer minimum  not happening til sometime in October.
That depends on a lot of things, so many that we could open up a poll and the expected day of minimum would still have a lot of spread. Better wait and watch, we are going to listen to all sorts of reason in all directions.
My take is that is going to be a late season with the day close to October because it was a year with early open-water and  bare land snow and this provides a lot of thermal  'inertia' so to speak. Pacific waters poured in generously, but I can't compare to other years. And the current storm is cold, but is stirring things up and precisely bringing stored heat in the ocean to the ice. Clouds of this storm dont block much solar radiation since there is no much anyway, but the argument 'they trap heat' not sure if it is valid since these are cold clouds, but experts on that may help.
Clear skies and still weather in September can also bring an early stop iirc.

Neven

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4185 on: August 20, 2016, 11:30:37 AM »
Not really detachment as such, but continuous thinning of the ESS protrusions:
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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4186 on: August 20, 2016, 11:39:58 AM »
That depends on a lot of things, so many that we could open up a poll and the expected day of minimum would still have a lot of spread.

Such a poll would be interesting!

Neven: I doubt that when and if detachment happens there's much ice left south of that event. Poof or not poof, that's the question (this point of view also coincides with the TOPAZ-graph posted by S.Pansa a bit up the discussion).
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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4187 on: August 20, 2016, 11:57:18 AM »
The August SIPN report is out:

https://www.arcus.org/sipn/sea-ice-outlook/2016/august

Quote
This month the median pan-Arctic extent Outlook for September 2016 sea ice extent is 4.4 million square kilometers (km2) with quartiles of 4.2 and 4.7 million km2, which is slightly higher than July's value (4.3 million km2) (See Figure 1 in the full report, below). If the median Outlook should agree with the observed estimate come September, this year would be the third lowest September in the satellite record. The spread in the Outlook contributions narrowed slightly from July to August, with an overall range this month of 3.7 to 5.2 million km2.

The breakup of the ice around O-Buoy 14 is mentioned, and the video now seems to be getting updated on a regular basis:

http://obuoy.datatransport.org/monitor#buoy14/movie
« Last Edit: August 20, 2016, 12:04:23 PM by Jim Hunt »
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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4188 on: August 20, 2016, 12:03:01 PM »
Wow with all this ocean rotation going on, may I suggest an alternate name for this phenomenon; The Maelstrom. :)
Actually, rather apt.

Thank you. Upon further reflection, the duration of these cyclones also fits the second definition of 'maelstrom':

"a restless, disordered, or tumultuous state of affairs"
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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4189 on: August 20, 2016, 12:23:21 PM »
Brought to attention by Neven at his blog, our baby arctic hurricane is pushing 40 knot winds around the compact core. Not good for the mute 2015F. The ice around it was very broken, not nearly as bad as at Beaufort but definitely not solid at all.
NW passage is going to open up before September it seems.
Edit: forgot to say that the "eye" of the storm is going to pass by very close to 2015F last reported location ~ (W140, N84). Below Modis Terra 7-2-1 picture of state of ice around that area on August 5.
« Last Edit: August 20, 2016, 01:18:31 PM by seaicesailor »

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4190 on: August 20, 2016, 12:28:11 PM »
What is the best source for comparing SSTs from one year to the next?  NOAA operational seems to show that 2012 had much warmer SSTs than now

Unisys also have an archive, but their colour scheme has changed recently and its very hard to compare the 2012 and 2016 images, perhaps the 2016 image is warmer though.  Trying some of the SST sites on Neven's graph page I can't find any other with archives.
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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4191 on: August 20, 2016, 12:35:42 PM »
Some are suggesting the main exit for the NorthWest Passage will open soon.  Looking at the imagery it would seem likely as there is barely another day's worth of ice lined up in the Beaufort to shove in there.  After that its clear water.

Similar for the Eastern Sea Route too - again its running out of ice to feed the block.

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4192 on: August 20, 2016, 01:34:50 PM »
Here a rather nonsense-prediction, given the long timeframe and low resolution, but this model of the Wetterzentrale shows detachment of the ice in the ESS going to happen within 252 hours. Northwest Passage still closed, though (just added: this image ROUGHLY represents the final shape of the September ice I expect).
« Last Edit: August 20, 2016, 01:39:57 PM by Thawing Thunder »
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seaicesailor

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4193 on: August 20, 2016, 01:43:47 PM »
Oops. Redux. Two GAC in a single season?!?
ECMWF Aug 23 to 25
Edit: The ensemble members concur on day 23 forecast.
Edit2: the shape of.the area of greater uncertainty in yellow suggests more solutions tend to forecast the low displaced toward Kara than toward the central Arctic ... or broken in two centers as previous hi-res forecast
Edit 3. That 1021 hPa -969 hPa dipole that was mentioned days ago by others is killer
« Last Edit: August 20, 2016, 02:22:51 PM by seaicesailor »

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4194 on: August 20, 2016, 02:21:46 PM »
The GFS going for a very strong storm hitting it's peak at about +90 hours. Nevermind summer, this would be a serious storm any time of the year.



Using the link below, if you drag the view to the Arctic and hit animate, the size and strength of the storm is quite clear. Only the typhoons moving up toward Kamchatka appear to have stronger winds.

http://www.meteociel.fr/modeles/gfse_3d.php?gfs05=1&mode=6&lat=90&lon=-7.5&ech=96&zoom=6
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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4195 on: August 20, 2016, 02:34:22 PM »
This is how it looks on Climate Reanalyzer:

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4196 on: August 20, 2016, 05:35:04 PM »
Wow with all this ocean rotation going on, may I suggest an alternate name for this phenomenon; The Maelstrom. :)
Actually, rather apt.

Thank you. Upon further reflection, the duration of these cyclones also fits the second definition of 'maelstrom':

"a restless, disordered, or tumultuous state of affairs"

An apt description of this thread at times as well.

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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4197 on: August 21, 2016, 12:36:10 AM »
Big chunk off Greenland. Is there a reef under water here or shallow area or what? This huge  piece will not move. Maybe just no current? I scanned through different days and the ice around it moved some. Is it maybe MYI  that's really heavy? Excuse me for thinking out loud. Will investigate further.
« Last Edit: August 21, 2016, 12:41:30 AM by Tigertown »
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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4198 on: August 21, 2016, 01:05:37 AM »
Is there a reef under water here or shallow area or what?

Check out "Belgica Bank" on the Jøkelbugt thread:

http://forum.arctic-sea-ice.net/index.php/topic,238.msg84993.html#msg84993
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Re: The 2016 melting season
« Reply #4199 on: August 21, 2016, 01:12:56 AM »
Regarding the persistent ice off the Northeast Coast of Greenland.  The same ice survived in 2012. This paper has a useful figure showing the topography underneath the surface here;
"A new view of the underside of Arctic sea ice"  (see figure 1.)

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2005GL025131/pdf