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F.Tnioli

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1500 on: May 25, 2017, 03:58:38 PM »
If the ECMWF 00z operational run is to believe, it's possible that we'll see a shift to more cloudy and low pressure dominated weather in the beginning of June. Such a senario, if it's a more prsistent one, will likely mean that the Arctic, once again, will dodge the bullet!!

Let's see what the ensemble says later today! :)

First attachment
25.0z ECMWF ensembles days 6-10 850mb temp anomaly

http://www.tropicaltidbits.com/analysis/models/?model=ecmwf-ens&region=nhem&pkg=T850aMean&runtime=2017052500&fh=168&xpos=0&ypos=376
I just couldn't resist to reflect on this, once i instantly noticed the following:

the shape of positive temperature anomaly near the pole (on the presented picture) is quite similar to the shape of a bullet, and looking at the scale and location of said anomaly, i am positive Arctic ain't dodging it.

Vader, i know you meant entirely different thing (you meant the season as a whole), but hey, we gotcha! %)
« Last Edit: May 25, 2017, 04:13:54 PM by F.Tnioli »
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Neven

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1501 on: May 25, 2017, 04:16:11 PM »
If Nares does not block up, what happens?
https://media.giphy.com/media/3oKIPiympmurT33vPO/giphy.gif
Hard for me to imagine the Nares blocking up with GFS now calling for the next 5 days of significant winds occurring there. The GFS has been trending that way and it's only gotten stronger.
I don't believe I've ever seen a traffic jam in Nares Strait once the arches broke. And I've looked for it, right after starting the ASIB (see here).
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F.Tnioli

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1502 on: May 25, 2017, 04:23:10 PM »
And if it never happened before, now with weaker ice (in general) it's quite guaranteed not to happen once the arches broke, you mean?

If so then may be gentlemen who were mentioning crazyness of Jet Stream were making a little counter-point. Things "very new and never seen before" might include a jam in Nares unlike anything anybody have seen before, too. If "all things right" for such a jam coincide. Certainly unlikely, of course. But, do you think it's a bit of a possibility, theoretically?
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oren

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1503 on: May 25, 2017, 05:25:33 PM »
Many things are possible in theory with negligible probability. Not really worth discussing in my view. But if you wish, the only practical way at this time to jam Nares is for Petermann to calve and produce as ice island.

seaicesailor

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1504 on: May 25, 2017, 05:28:45 PM »
The ice drift for the next six days as forecasted by ACNFS, which I find always interesting (if presented at a speed the human can process).
Note the couple of days of rushing toward the Nares Strait ... will make for some interesting pics.

In general the ice continues its gradual slow tendency of drifting away from the Pacific.

Archimid

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1505 on: May 25, 2017, 05:29:33 PM »
Maybe enough of that ice gets pushed west past the straight and into the Beaufort. The winds and drift maps do not favor that outcome, but maybe we get lucky.
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FishOutofWater

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1506 on: May 25, 2017, 05:51:00 PM »
The ECMWF ensemble model is indicating an absolutely disastrous warm subsidence high may become established over the north pole in early June. That's a planetary 5 wave pattern locked by the Gulf Stream and the Kuroshio currents. The 5 wave pattern can become stationary.

There is nothing good in that forecast run for sea ice. That forecast is the opposite of June 2013.

dosibl

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1507 on: May 25, 2017, 11:03:00 PM »
It seems the first-year ice bowl has just about arrived at the north pole, this feature has been pretty easy to track on the HYCOM 365.
https://www7320.nrlssc.navy.mil/hycomARC/navo/arcticictn_nowcast_anim365d.gif

Judging by how mobile the surviving ice was last fall/winter, it looks like first-year ice from the Laptev sea all the way to the pole.


subgeometer

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1508 on: May 26, 2017, 03:02:06 AM »
It seems the first-year ice bowl has just about arrived at the north pole, this feature has been pretty easy to track on the HYCOM 365.
https://www7320.nrlssc.navy.mil/hycomARC/navo/arcticictn_nowcast_anim365d.gif

Judging by how mobile the surviving ice was last fall/winter, it looks like first-year ice from the Laptev sea all the way to the pole.

Even the thicker ice exiting to the Barents near Svalbard is totally fractured. It's like a new kind of preconditioning for dispersion and ultimately melt.

The gif is the area from 80.5618°,37.7858 to 81.8470°, 27.3577° which is an area just north of a line between Svalbard and FJL form May 22-4. I've repeated May24 as the first frame as it's cloudfree

subgeometer

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1509 on: May 26, 2017, 03:30:23 AM »
Fracturing extends right across the pole . This is a worldview image for May21 when skies were clear from 82.6741°, 89.5667° to  84.7954°, -133.7105°

I've darkened the image in levels to accentuate the cracks

Tigertown

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1510 on: May 26, 2017, 03:58:26 AM »
Yes, and all the areas that are supposed to be thick MYI are thus fractured.
"....and the appointed time came for God to bring to ruin those ruining the earth." Revelation 11:18.

epiphyte

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1511 on: May 26, 2017, 06:04:59 AM »
Is it just me or is GFS completely out of it's depth w.r.t the Pacific side of the arctic right now? Every run seems to be devolving into chaos over the Beaufort 24-48 hours out, and sometimes (e.g. today) even it's 12-hour picture seems (going by nullschool at least) off-base.

Ice Shieldz

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1512 on: May 26, 2017, 06:31:22 AM »
Worldview 4-21 to 4-25 ice movement through Lincoln Sea and Nares Straight. Big slab in Kane Basin shown clearly disintegrated on 4-25.  Amazing how the ice both disintegrates after entering the Nares and then seems to speed up in the straight.

I'm not sure how the Kane gyre works, but the ice escapes it by directly exiting the basin along the CAA side. Note that these worldview images have been enhanced with curves contrast adjustment and an unsharp mask filter.

VeliAlbertKallio

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1513 on: May 26, 2017, 06:49:39 AM »
The "beaver force", a sort of off-shoot force from the deep Gulf Stream's energy, in action causing or helping to splinter MYI between the Fram Strait and North Pole:

I am not at all surprised that MYI breaks between the Fram Strait and North Pole. In this area there is an unaccounted force attacking sea ice from beneath. Back in 2007 the-then-editor of Weather magazine asked me to publish these and write an article but I never accomplished it. (So only the people attending the various conference where I have presented it have heard it.)

I first show the image of 'zebra ice' which is basically the back-n'-forth heaving of the Arctic Ocean which fights the riparian discharges falling from Siberia. On sea ice this causes an undulating sea ice surface contour when the winds scatter snow along the surface of sea ice. Snow then predominantly accumulates on the wave troughs (white stripes), with crests on ice left barren (green stripes). As a result, the sea ice appears to have zebra-like stripes that originate from the river estuary. The troughs are more saline and dense water, the crests are less dense fresh water. When snow is then blown across the ice, it accumulates on troughs above denser sea water.

Once these breakwater discharges or 'riparian waves' reach the continental slope they fall into deep ocean forming vertical eddies. These eddies then sink and warm up in deep current (the Gulf Stream) and bounce to the surface near the North Pole (just in the area behind the Fram Strait).

The vertical eddies are equivalents of cumulus clouds in sea water: the centre has a strong rising water, while their edges have a falling water stream (a down draft). Once rebounding eddies hit the sea ice on the surface, they break it, or bend it, from beneath. A 'spahghetti ice' forms: curved, bending sea ice features that are highly distinctive from sharp ice forms of the ice floes.

The expansionary energy is extracted from the thermal inertia of the Gulf Stream when the non-saline eddies venture into it from above, they then densify and warm further until at critical point somewhere above +4C start becoming less dense than the more saline Gulf Stream water. Then they suddenly rebound the surface causing ice leads to widen, the sea ice to form elevated domes like floating immense pancakes or more irregular spaghetti-like curved meanders in ice.

I am also showing how the breakwater conveyor stitches onto rotating MYI at the rear end of the Arctic Ocean - due to velocity differentials and divergent directions a series of parallel perpendicular drifts open along the Komsomoletski Island - Ellesmere Island 'barrier'. Of course, we no more have solid MYI disk at the rear or anywhere, so this bit is now purely historic (bygone) feature that the Arctic Ocean once had.

What these rebounding eddies mean is that there is a hammer beneath ice that is pushing sea ice up and breking it (or widening the leads in sea ice). I am calling this here as "beaver force" after the Clovis period North Americans who believed that there were beavers underneath the Foxe-Laurentide Ice Dome that lifted it up to cause sudden, unpredictable (Jokullhaup) floods.
« Last Edit: May 26, 2017, 06:58:46 AM by VeliAlbertKallio »
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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1514 on: May 26, 2017, 07:02:24 AM »
This comparison image shows the difference between vertical eddies and sea ice floes (North Pole - Fram Strait area) which currently sees lots of sea ice transport (see the previous post).
"Setting off atomic bombs is considered socially pungent as the years are made of fleeting ice that are painted by the piling up of the rays of the sun."

Ice Shieldz

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1515 on: May 26, 2017, 08:06:56 AM »
If this 5day GFS forecast verifies, the pack is in for some dipole mayhem. The barents sea LP is 986hpa and then we have that pole hovering HP, both of which FOW alluded to. Not sure if the preconditioning of warm temps and clear skies matter that much relative to the kinetic energy being imparted on the pack, the upwelling and dispersion into the melt zones of the Barents, and Greenland seas.

« Last Edit: May 26, 2017, 08:33:54 AM by Ice Shieldz »

epiphyte

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1516 on: May 26, 2017, 08:52:46 AM »
Worldview 4-21 to 4-25 ice movement through Lincoln Sea and Nares Straight. Big slab in Kane Basin shown clearly disintegrated on 4-25.  Amazing how the ice both disintegrates after entering the Nares and then seems to speed up in the straight.

I'm not sure how the Kane gyre works, but the ice escapes it by directly exiting the basin along the CAA side. Note that these worldview images have been enhanced with curves contrast adjustment and an unsharp mask filter.

If I've correctly identified "Big slab" it never travelled down the strait, but rather broke off the fast ice off the Greenland side of the Kane Basin (~50km NE of it's May 24th location)  on April 20th, hung around there for a few days before it's North-Western edge got caught in the flow and pulled it south. It looked to get hung up on something a few days ago (it managed to spin in place ~180 degrees around a single point - a neat trick for an ~2000km^2 object weighing at least a few billion tons! ), before moving down a little further.

It almost seems as though the reason it's breaking up so quickly now is that it ran aground at a point somewhere on the southern side, (oddly enough at the place where the arch usually forms) and pivoted anti-clockwise. At that point it was either going to block the strait, or get smashed to bits trying. Must have been quite a spectacle - Strange to think that probably no one was there to see it.


binntho

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1517 on: May 26, 2017, 09:00:49 AM »
Thanks VeliAlbertKallio for your fantastic posts!
because a thing is eloquently expressed it should not be taken to be as necessarily true
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oren

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1518 on: May 26, 2017, 09:52:40 AM »
Epiphyte this has been discussed upthread in the Nares Strait thread, yes this huge slab broke off the fast ice, but no it couldn't have been grounded as the water is far too deep in Kane Basin. The rotation probably ocurred due to the faster current on the Ellesmere side, plus maybe some reverse curreny or gyre on the Greenland side, plus some wind effects.
I wish its breakup could have been filmed up close.

F.Tnioli

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1519 on: May 26, 2017, 12:52:02 PM »
Many things are possible in theory with negligible probability. Not really worth discussing in my view. But if you wish, the only practical way at this time to jam Nares is for Petermann to calve and produce as ice island.
That bad? Yeah, no point then. >< I'm sorry for being such a... dreamer.
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oren

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1520 on: May 26, 2017, 01:49:57 PM »
F. Tnioli, I apologize if my comment came across as negative. It was not meant that way.

F.Tnioli

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1521 on: May 26, 2017, 02:22:24 PM »
F. Tnioli, I apologize if my comment came across as negative. It was not meant that way.
No need; i didn't take it that way even a bit. It was your opinion, and your opinion is one i respect quite much (way more than my own) on this subject. Still, thanks! )

P.S. "That bad" in my previous post was about state of the ice, - not about state of your post!
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Archimid

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1522 on: May 26, 2017, 03:20:18 PM »
SSTA from 2015,2016,2017 according to NOAA
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seaicesailor

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1523 on: May 26, 2017, 03:24:19 PM »
This Terra 7-2-1 image is from yesterday, I believe some surface melting in the Beaufort sea corner near McKenzie Delta.
Today is pretty cloudy, no image yet;
Warm 2m temps above zero are supposed to spread from Canada into the Arctic for the next 72 hours.

Thomas Barlow

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1524 on: May 26, 2017, 03:42:29 PM »
Looking only at the Arctic basin (instead of overall extent or thickness for the Arctic Circle and beyond) using DMI, I think it's fair to say that the icepack is not as robust this year as last year.
« Last Edit: May 26, 2017, 03:53:53 PM by Thomas Barlow »

subgeometer

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1525 on: May 26, 2017, 03:53:37 PM »
How long till the northern route opens? Days?  ;)

 If you look in Worldview it's floes interspersed with rubble the whole way, out beyond the land fast ice, not to mention the open water appearing. And the ice  appears very thin

magnamentis

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1526 on: May 26, 2017, 03:58:43 PM »
Looking only at the Arctic basin (instead of overall extent or thickness for the Arctic Circle and beyond) using DMI, I think it's fair to say that the icepack is not as robust this year as last year.

yes and last year it was already not robust at all which means it's in lies in shards and while this fact alone will more sooner than later show it's impact, i think that the resulting mobility of the entire ice cover will be one key factor to make the BIG difference. provided the weather won't prevent it i assume it will happen this season but certainly the next 2012 like melt season will kill it close to all.

Tor Bejnar

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1527 on: May 26, 2017, 05:04:08 PM »
Looking only at the Arctic basin (instead of overall extent or thickness for the Arctic Circle and beyond) using DMI, I think it's fair to say that the icepack is not as robust this year as last year.

partial cross post below:  I find it curious that maps show 4+ meter ice where, when actually measured, average 3 meters thick.
Another cross-post:
...
measurements taken by scientists on the ice in that area show a mean thickness of 3m
http://blogs.esa.int/campaignearth/2017/05/01/cryovex-first-results-show-sea-ice-continues-to-thin/
Screen shot from this paper showing the four (western) Lincoln Sea ice bridge ice thickness measurements [and snow depths] on (apparently) April 12, 2017:
Quote
At 12 Twin Otter landing sites between 83N and 87.1N, we gathered 36.7 km of electromagnetic (EM) ice- and snow-thickness data and acquired some 13 000 snow-thickness measurements. EM soundings were calibrated with drill-hole measurements. Data were edited to remove any bias due to thinner snow and ice conditions in the immediate vicinity of our landing sites, which were mostly on refrozen leads. Our results represent conditions on thick, old first- and multiyear ice floes typical for the wider regions around the landing sites.
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jai mitchell

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1528 on: May 26, 2017, 05:13:18 PM »
I am calling this here as "beaver force" after the Clovis period North Americans who believed that there were beavers underneath the Foxe-Laurentide Ice Dome that lifted it up to cause sudden, unpredictable (Jokullhaup) floods.

VeilAlbertKallio,

please see my response:

http://forum.arctic-sea-ice.net/index.php/topic,852.msg114814.html#msg114814
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FishOutofWater

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1529 on: May 26, 2017, 05:24:58 PM »
Looking only at the Arctic basin (instead of overall extent or thickness for the Arctic Circle and beyond) using DMI, I think it's fair to say that the icepack is not as robust this year as last year.

partial cross post below:  I find it curious that maps show 4+ meter ice where, when actually measured, average 3 meters thick.
Another cross-post:
...
measurements taken by scientists on the ice in that area show a mean thickness of 3m
http://blogs.esa.int/campaignearth/2017/05/01/cryovex-first-results-show-sea-ice-continues-to-thin/
Screen shot from this paper showing the four (western) Lincoln Sea ice bridge ice thickness measurements [and snow depths] on (apparently) April 12, 2017:
Quote
At 12 Twin Otter landing sites between 83N and 87.1N, we gathered 36.7 km of electromagnetic (EM) ice- and snow-thickness data and acquired some 13 000 snow-thickness measurements. EM soundings were calibrated with drill-hole measurements. Data were edited to remove any bias due to thinner snow and ice conditions in the immediate vicinity of our landing sites, which were mostly on refrozen leads. Our results represent conditions on thick, old first- and multiyear ice floes typical for the wider regions around the landing sites.


That 3m thick ice in the Lincoln sea is not only shattering when it approaches the Nares strait, it is melting into oblivion. I suspect that the winter long flow of water through the Nares, combined with coastal upwelling, has put relatively warm and very saline Atlantic layer water in direct contact with the 3 meter thick ice entering the Nares strait.

It's shocking watching ice we thought was 4 meters thick just vanish.

Tor Bejnar

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1530 on: May 26, 2017, 05:59:42 PM »
I agree the Lincoln Sea ice (ave 3m) is shattering as it approaches Nares Strait (as it does every year, although usually not until July) and when it hits the edges of or islands in the strait, but I don't think I see it melting into oblivion, merely rapidly going south where it will melt into oblivion.  The "Big Chunk" (as someone described it) of fast ice that grew in Kane Basin is, apparently, melting some in situ as it disintegrates in or near Smith Sound.
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Tigertown

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1531 on: May 26, 2017, 06:22:11 PM »
Two meter waves in Nares and Kane Basin right now with 50km/hr winds.
Bigger waves predicted in the same area for two days starting tomorrow. Will be curious to see the effects, as if the situation could get worse. At the very least some of the nearby passage ice may get busted up.
« Last Edit: May 26, 2017, 06:53:28 PM by Tigertown »
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Lord M Vader

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1532 on: May 26, 2017, 07:08:46 PM »
We can be fortune that this forecast from GFS 12z op run is in Utopia aka Fantasyland and not 2-3 days ahead! THAT would have been a pure disaster!


bbr2314

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1533 on: May 26, 2017, 09:22:53 PM »
Snow cover/volume is obviously still dropping somewhat, but holy cow -- the departure from norm has never been larger as a relative % this season. We are now roughly double++ where we should be, thanks mostly to the Himalayas, and partially to the northern tier of Russia. The Himalayas may endure the entirety of the melt season IMO!




It should also be noted that North American volume has nosedived from way above average to normal this month. While this is hardly unprecedented, the sheer cliff we have seen will amount to ~700KM3 of volume by the end of the month. Seasonal discharge is normally quite slower, and also happens earlier in the season than this year in most years, so this will have some substantial impact on the NATL, or perhaps already is, given how cold SSTs are off Quebec/Newfoundland (and the implications on land were clear given the massive floods we saw in Quebec). How much more volume will it take before the impacts escalate even further, and how much farther down the line til that happens? It could feasibly occur next melt season...



What was the volume lost by Lake Agassiz during discharge?

Finally, it should be noted that given the cliff seen in NAmerica this past month, we could feasibly see something similar occur across the Himalayas during the summer. Whether it happens or not remains to be seen, but if it does, that would portend epic flooding across the Indus Valley and Pakistan (IMO).


« Last Edit: May 26, 2017, 09:30:25 PM by bbr2314 »

oren

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1534 on: May 26, 2017, 11:08:01 PM »
It should also be noted that North American volume has nosedived from way above average to normal this month. While this is hardly unprecedented, the sheer cliff we have seen will amount to ~700KM3 of volume by the end of the month. Seasonal discharge is normally quite slower, and also happens earlier in the season than this year in most years, so this will have some substantial impact on the NATL, or perhaps already is, given how cold SSTs are off Quebec/Newfoundland (and the implications on land were clear given the massive floods we saw in Quebec). How much more volume will it take before the impacts escalate even further, and how much farther down the line til that happens? It could feasibly occur next melt season...

What was the volume lost by Lake Agassiz during discharge?
Interesting question in itself though OT here, so I'll keep it short. It seems the answer is several thousands of km3, all discharging in the same direction, as opposed to 700 km3 over a very large area discharging in several directions and partially seeping into the ground. One paper I've found, https://pubs.er.usgs.gov/publication/70032297, provides modeled constraints on Lake Agassiz discharge of 1600 km3 - 9500 km3 through the St. Lawrence Estuary. So no, I doubt the snowmelt will escalate impacts on this or next melt season.

Hyperion

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1535 on: May 27, 2017, 12:11:53 AM »
Quote
What was the volume lost by Lake Agassiz during discharge?

From what I've read in the past on the Agassiz discharges it was not one but something in the region of 25 to 100 separate events.
However. I have to wonder if the subglacial lakeburst explanation is the whole story in the light of the finding in 2011 that some 1/3 of the Greenland icecap contained a shallow "slush-aquifer" of estimated then around 70000 cubic km of water from surface melt soaking down, not refreezing but sitting in a subsurface slush layer at high altitude, from a few meters to 100m below the surface. No doubt this volume has increased substantially. I definitely consider it plausible that some earthquake, or a crossing of a threshold of liquid content or temperature could cause massive quantities of this slushifer to suddenly drain in thousands of cubic km "slushalanches". And this could cause a cascade effect of sudden isostatic adjustments producing large quakes and subglacial vulcanism.
The fact that the slushifer phenomena was a complete surprise to glacial science when it was discovered just 6 years ago likely has not given anywhere near enough time for science to reassess its assumptions regarding the Agassiz hypothesis.

if the keel of Greenlands main deep basaltic dyke connection is Iceland, the hydraulic pressure release of the 70000 cubic km estimated in 2011, could cause a hydraulic near instant subsidence of 350m of Iceland by the Calcs I did three years ago.  :(
Policy: The diversion of NZ aluminum production to build giant space-mirrors to melt the icecaps and destroy the foolish greed-worshiping cities of man. Thereby returning man to the sea, which he should never have left in the first place.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McGillicuddy_Serious_Party

bbr2314

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1536 on: May 27, 2017, 05:36:33 AM »
It should also be noted that North American volume has nosedived from way above average to normal this month. While this is hardly unprecedented, the sheer cliff we have seen will amount to ~700KM3 of volume by the end of the month. Seasonal discharge is normally quite slower, and also happens earlier in the season than this year in most years, so this will have some substantial impact on the NATL, or perhaps already is, given how cold SSTs are off Quebec/Newfoundland (and the implications on land were clear given the massive floods we saw in Quebec). How much more volume will it take before the impacts escalate even further, and how much farther down the line til that happens? It could feasibly occur next melt season...

What was the volume lost by Lake Agassiz during discharge?
Interesting question in itself though OT here, so I'll keep it short. It seems the answer is several thousands of km3, all discharging in the same direction, as opposed to 700 km3 over a very large area discharging in several directions and partially seeping into the ground. One paper I've found, https://pubs.er.usgs.gov/publication/70032297, provides modeled constraints on Lake Agassiz discharge of 1600 km3 - 9500 km3 through the St. Lawrence Estuary. So no, I doubt the snowmelt will escalate impacts on this or next melt season.

I think the 700KM3 mostly discharged through St. Lawrence, considering the vast bulk of snowmass in North America was in Quebec prior to melting (very anomalously deep). Other watersheds would be Hudson Bay and directly into Baffin Bay, but the bulk would still be running off through the Atlantic, which, IMO, has increased its relative impact.

It cannot be denied that this will have some impact on the melt season -- albeit probably fairly small -- but it should be emphasized that if this trend continues (anomalously high snow depth + anomalously late/rapid melt), the eventual impacts will be much larger than we are currently seeing.

In any case, thank you for the Agassiz data points, and Hyperion brings up good points too re: gradual release through separate events. I wonder what the difference between a 700KM3 discharge in one month vs. a 1,500KM3 discharge in the same time period would be WRT impacts to AMOC? I would think that doubling the melting would pass the threshold of "significant" given that temps SE of Canada are already colder than most any year in recent record.

Finally, it should be noted that Greenland's surface-mass-balance is... *substantially* higher than normal through this winter, in fact, above any year since record-keeping began for DMI. While most/all of this will melt over the summer, it shows that the oscillations we are seeing are now resulting in substantially more winter snowfall over much of the Northern Hemisphere, which is impacting weather patterns further into the spring than it previously did thanks to the sheer increase in relative volume versus past years.




« Last Edit: May 27, 2017, 05:44:47 AM by bbr2314 »

Tigertown

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1537 on: May 27, 2017, 05:41:08 AM »
Subtly things are opening up. So slow, you barely notice one day's worth; but add a few days together and, voila!
"....and the appointed time came for God to bring to ruin those ruining the earth." Revelation 11:18.

bbr2314

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1538 on: May 27, 2017, 07:06:38 AM »
I would have to guess this is extremely abnormal; per the GEM and other models, the Himalayas may end up becoming the coldest spot in the Northern Hemisphere, at least temporarily, due to the abundance of snowcover:

Anomalies:



Absolute temps:



Quite incredible, and I believe, unprecedented?

subgeometer

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1539 on: May 27, 2017, 08:19:09 AM »
Subtly things are opening up. So slow, you barely notice one day's worth; but add a few days together and, voila!

Clockwise rotation of most of the pack, and a bulge of further export to Fram keeping up extent, but that ice loss will be felt later.

Here are a couple of gifs - one of Fram Strait over the past couple of weeks and the block smash in Nares strait.

I've published a bit of python code for retreiving sequences of worldview images over on the gif creation thread - it's already helpful but its just a snippet so far http://forum.arctic-sea-ice.net/index.php/topic,1259.msg114906.html#msg114906

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1540 on: May 27, 2017, 08:36:24 AM »
Beaufort Sea is not looking good all the way from Banks Island to Barrow. Also lot of fast ice broke off near Barrow. Images: Worldview, May 24 - May 26.

Lord M Vader

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1541 on: May 27, 2017, 11:31:30 AM »
ECMWF Ensemble for 00z today is not a funny one depicting high pressure dominated weather over the next 10 days.Remains to see if the temps manage to climb above freezing point and make some major damage or not. If we are lucky the forecasts might change and we get a situation similar to 2014.. But not very likely at the moment right now.

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1542 on: May 27, 2017, 11:33:20 AM »
I would have to guess this is extremely abnormal; per the GEM and other models, the Himalayas may end up becoming the coldest spot in the Northern Hemisphere, at least temporarily, due to the abundance of snowcover:

Anomalies:



Absolute temps:



Quite incredible, and I believe, unprecedented?

Cold airmasses tend to seek Refuge where last remaining Great Icemasses reside. Himalayas will soon overcome the Arctic, it seems. Not much time left.

prokaryotes

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1543 on: May 27, 2017, 11:41:25 AM »
Alaska's Sea Ice Is Melting Unusually Early, 'Another Sign Arctic Is Unraveling' https://insideclimatenews.org/news/25052017/arctic-sea-ice-disappearing-alaska-climate-change-warm-winter-chukchi-sea

arctic-watcher

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1544 on: May 27, 2017, 04:27:28 PM »
And unless I'm misreading it, it's now it's the GFS that appears to be the most ice friendly, at least with temperatures, in the coming week.  An odd switch from the past few weeks.
 
ECMWF Ensemble for 00z today is not a funny one depicting high pressure dominated weather over the next 10 days.Remains to see if the temps manage to climb above freezing point and make some major damage or not. If we are lucky the forecasts might change and we get a situation similar to 2014.. But not very likely at the moment right now.

bbr2314

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1545 on: May 27, 2017, 06:57:30 PM »
As we lose snowcover, temps are going to spike to extraordinary levels over the far northern tier, with dual areas of +20-25C anomalies now anticipated across Siberia and the Yukon... this time period is preceded by mid-90s over much of the northern Prairies as well.

It is probably a matter of weeks until we see much of these regions burst into flames, which will

A) add vast amounts of smoke to the Arctic, increasing insolation underneath and depositing soot onto the ice, decreasing its albedo, and

B) probably result in another Fort McMurray situation elsewhere in the Prairies or Siberia -- the amount of warmth depicted is truly staggering.



Neven

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1546 on: May 27, 2017, 09:46:39 PM »
This is a highly interesting melting season so far.  I'm expecting fireworks once the Atlantic side of the Arctic comes into play.

As for where it could end up, these highs dominating don't bode well when it comes to melting momentum. I'll try and find some time this week to compare to previous years.
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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1547 on: May 27, 2017, 09:56:34 PM »
Kimmirut Weather looks like the sea ice is melting from 24/05/2017? (Melt-ponds?)

Someone fell through in Pang, tragically.

There's plenty of melt ponds in Iqaluit starting this past week according to my partner (I'm down south, packing our stuff to ship it up). On the PSA Facebook group for Iqaluit there's been talk of thinning ice since last weekend. Another friend went out on the bay yesterday though, says it was fine.

From what I hear it's pretty much the normal time for the ice to break up. The weather was very warm in December, but average the rest of the winter, in South Baffin. Unlike the rest of the Arctic!

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1548 on: May 28, 2017, 12:51:07 AM »
Two meter waves in Nares and Kane Basin right now with 50km/hr winds.
Bigger waves predicted in the same area for two days starting tomorrow. Will be curious to see the effects, as if the situation could get worse. At the very least some of the nearby passage ice may get busted up.

Extra clear image of Nares and Kane today, with many areas affected. It looks like a blowtorch has hit.

I've chosen a few areas for the animations below. The last one is of an area of Parry Channel which appears to be melting out rather than breaking up (though other areas further down have broken up).

See Worldview
« Last Edit: May 28, 2017, 09:02:56 AM by bairgon »

bbr2314

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Re: The 2017 melting season
« Reply #1549 on: May 28, 2017, 01:08:55 AM »
The CAA is going to be absolutely smoked in the next two weeks...