Arctic Ice Discussion - 2010 Freeze Up

[barrel1234]

Any chance of another comparison map for ice extents compared to 2007?

[BornFromTheVoid]

Any chance of another comparison map for ice extents compared to 2007?

http://igloo.atmos.uiuc.edu/cgi-bin/test/print.sh?fm=10&fd=11&fy=2007&sm=10&sd=11&sy=2010

We're way above 2007, by over 1 million km2.

I agree with you GW. The push south should be starting in the next day or 2 so it will be interesting to watch what happens. Would be a real pity to lose that ice and start really slowing down the extent growth which seemed to be going well for a while.

[barrel1234]

Thats great, I have been looking for that website without success, very interesting, I it looks like the ice is starting to push south now around Greenland

[Thundery wintry showers]

I think we were quite "fortunate" this year in some respects- remember all of that thin, low-concentration ice in the sector adjacent to Asia in early September? Much of that appears to have survived. We need that area of ice to firmly re-establish itself over the next couple of years or else a repeat of 2007 could melt it all away and leave us with the "ice-free pole" scenario that Iceberg mentioned some time ago.

[BornFromTheVoid]

The IJIS site has updates to give us a 100,000km2 gain today, so back up to average gains! We need to maintain at least average gains if we don't want to slip back into the 2nd lowest spot once more...

[Gray-Wolf]

Until we all get to grips with the 'changes' to the pack, as illustrated by the noughties study highlighting the 'growth stall' in pack ice thickness, and that these 'changes' are ongoing (a 'trend if I may?) then we will have folk talking tosh about 'recovery' every time we enter Autumn.

As the 'new' lozenge shaped ice floes in the Lincoln Sea highlight, thin ice will act differently than deep, thick ice. If we are to accept that some mechanism is limiting ice depth (as the ongoing study from ICESat/Grace, IceBridge show) then we either have temperatures not 'freezing' the way they used too (How????) or ice undergoing basal melt as it thickens, or is pushed into, this new 'melt zone' .

With an increased mobility in the pack (as the buoy data shows us) then the areas experiencing 'enhanced precipitation rates' will see a lot of ice flow under it over a winter. Any 'storms' will depress the ice deeper into the 'melt zone' leaving an odd sandwich of pack snow and ice (with the 'integrity' we hear reported).

Recovery will occur when we know of areas of perennial that have reached the 9m threshold (and are impervious to 'static melt out' even in a 'perfect storm' synoptic) and that these areas are becoming the predominant ice type over the melt season. I know we must start somewhere but I certainly am not seeing what I need to see at the moment.

[cooling climate]

Until we all get to grips with the 'changes' to the pack, as illustrated by the noughties study highlighting the 'growth stall' in pack ice thickness, and that these 'changes' are ongoing (a 'trend if I may?) then we will have folk talking tosh about 'recovery' every time we enter Autumn.

As the 'new' lozenge shaped ice floes in the Lincoln Sea highlight, thin ice will act differently than deep, thick ice. If we are to accept that some mechanism is limiting ice depth (as the ongoing study from ICESat/Grace, IceBridge show) then we either have temperatures not 'freezing' the way they used too (How????) or ice undergoing basal melt as it thickens, or is pushed into, this new 'melt zone' .

With an increased mobility in the pack (as the buoy data shows us) then the areas experiencing 'enhanced precipitation rates' will see a lot of ice flow under it over a winter. Any 'storms' will depress the ice deeper into the 'melt zone' leaving an odd sandwich of pack snow and ice (with the 'integrity' we hear reported).

Recovery will occur when we know of areas of perennial that have reached the 9m threshold (and are impervious to 'static melt out' even in a 'perfect storm' synoptic) and that these areas are becoming the predominant ice type over the melt season. I know we must start somewhere but I certainly am not seeing what I need to see at the moment.

That is because you have blind folds on and are just repeating the same old same old.

[stewfox]

Recovery will occur when we know of areas of perennial that have reached the 9m threshold (and are impervious to 'static melt out' even in a 'perfect storm' synoptic) and that these areas are becoming the predominant ice type over the melt season. I know we must start somewhere but I certainly am not seeing what I need to see at the moment.

Thats not going to happen in a year

What I would like to see is a standard winters growth with max extent upto 15m. Continued recovery of 3/4yr old ice.

Ice volume increasng slowly and mins between 5m and 6m next year

All look likely. It wont get back to 1970s in 1/2 yrs.

[Gray-Wolf]

stew! I honestly believe that if 1st/2nd/3rd/4th/5th year ice is not like the 'old ice' (as we are told and 'findings' from data) then this will mean (for me at least) that we have no way of knowing how it will react to 'normal seasons' (as we have been witnessing)

If it is a 'new' type of ice with a brine filled snow as a crust then we cannot say that "this will happen..." or " that will happen..." as we have no analogue apart from it's obvious inferiority to the old , long lived, de-brined, multiyear-ed, thick ice.

NSIDC tell us that the vast majority of the ice now in the basin is 5 years old (or less) and this places it all in this new ice type age range.

I suppose that someone will now tell me that is is not happening.......

Edited October 15, 2010 by Gray-Wolf

[jethro]

So if we have no analogues with which to compare it is impossible to say anything, with any degree of certainty about the future. The ice waxes and wanes, at some point in the past (any time in the past, distant or near) some of the ice must have been as young as some of the ice today and it survived to become older ice. Assuming that young ice will inevitably melt and we're stuck with young ice, leading to no ice is a huuuuuuuuge assumption.

As Stewfox said, it isn't going to recover in a year or two, it's taken three decades (at least) to reach the current state, that won't reverse in a blink of an eye. Small but steady, year on year gains is what folk should look for IMO but allowing for losses which can be explained by annual weather events.

[Gray-Wolf]

So if we have no analogues with which to compare it is impossible to say anything, with any degree of certainty about the future. The ice waxes and wanes, at some point in the past (any time in the past, distant or near) some of the ice must have been as young as some of the ice today and it survived to become older ice. Assuming that young ice will inevitably melt and we're stuck with young ice, leading to no ice is a huuuuuuuuge assumption.

J, if the ice is a result of warmer planet and increased precipitation rates (warmer oceans,loss of halocline and swamped by snow) then it's worse than that but ,and I mean but, the structural integrity of the 'new ice' is something that it's behaviour willl be apparent even to 'newbies' to the subject.

Apples with apples, pears with pears.......yes ,we have no bananas...............

[MR EXTREMES]

So if we have no analogues with which to compare it is impossible to say anything, with any degree of certainty about the future. The ice waxes and wanes, at some point in the past (any time in the past, distant or near) some of the ice must have been as young as some of the ice today and it survived to become older ice. Assuming that young ice will inevitably melt and we're stuck with young ice, leading to no ice is a huuuuuuuuge assumption.

As Stewfox said, it isn't going to recover in a year or two, it's taken three decades (at least) to reach the current state, that won't reverse in a blink of an eye. Small but steady, year on year gains is what folk should look for IMO but allowing for losses which can be explained by annual weather events.

absolutely agree with this and with the current state of our climate its very possible year on year gains could happen i think we maybe past the warming period,

and entering a cooldown with lots of things going for rather than against ice growth.

more so with the behavour of our jet stream and solar minimum along with neg pdo but still lets wait and see.

and its simple it took years to melt the ice it will take years to recover the ice,

iceages didnt take effect in a couple of years they take decades.

[NorthNorfolkWeather]

stew! I honestly believe that if 1st/2nd/3rd/4th/5th year ice is not like the 'old ice' (as we are told and 'findings' from data) then this will mean (for me at least) that we have no way of knowing how it will react to 'normal seasons' (as we have been witnessing)

If it is a 'new' type of ice with a brine filled snow as a crust then we cannot say that "this will happen..." or " that will happen..." as we have no analogue apart from it's obvious inferiority to the old , long lived, de-brined, multiyear-ed, thick ice.

NSIDC tell us that the vast majority of the ice now in the basin is 5 years old (or less) and this places it all in this new ice type age range.

I suppose that someone will now tell me that is is not happening.......

Why would the be brine filled snow? Please explain as I've always been told that rain, and snow is fresh water only, if it's landing on ice, then is should not be brine filled....

[Yorkshiresnows]

Why would the be brine filled snow? Please explain as I've always been told that rain, and snow is fresh water only, if it's landing on ice, then is should not be brine filled....

Quite, ...... but the posts by some on this thread have now crossed the point of reality ...... into somewhere else !!

Y.S

[jethro]

J, if the ice is a result of warmer planet and increased precipitation rates (warmer oceans,loss of halocline and swamped by snow) then it's worse than that but ,and I mean but, the structural integrity of the 'new ice' is something that it's behaviour willl be apparent even to 'newbies' to the subject.

Apples with apples, pears with pears.......yes ,we have no bananas...............

Trouble with that stance is the assumption that all of the ice loss is caused by AGW and that simply isn't the case. At best, CO2 and the induced warming is only partly to blame - that's not a sceptic view, that's an IPCC endorsed view.

Which ever fruit is chosen, you'll always end up with a fruit cocktail because proxy data is a vague parameter, not an empirical record.

[Gray-Wolf]

. At best, CO2 and the induced warming is only partly to blame -

Which ever fruit is chosen, you'll always end up with a fruit cocktail because proxy data is a vague parameter, not an empirical record.

Couldn't agree more J'. Problem is that , even before any 'melting'/temp rises', if you'd taken the polar ice away the planet would not have regrown it. The planet held onto the ice because of the feedbacks of the ice it self.

We are now in the final phase of summer ice and ,soon enough, we will have an ice free basin (<1 million sq km) and the planet will warm to the temps that this 'alteration' demands until the new 'equilibrium' is reached.

Sure we will have winter ice but ,as I keep banging on about, it ain't as simple as that.

With open water we have 'normal ocean processes' resuming across the basin and this means the destruction of the Halocline and so closes the opportunity of 'regrowth' of deep perennial ice (the 'backbone of summer ice' in the old system). I'm sure that there will be 'variation' in the amounts of ice around the basin (come summers end) but once we establish a sub million pack I don't think that it will be very long before the summer min no longer exceeds this in it's variability.

The next question is 'winter ice'. We have seen a very rapid reduction in summer ice but we have also seen 'winter ice' trending down wards. We know that ice 'volume' has reduced down as the ice thinned but will the change to the summer pack (and it's impacts on global circulation) impact winter ice extents through the later part of this century?

[jethro]

We are now in the final phase of summer ice and ,soon enough, we will have an ice free basin (<1 million sq km) and the planet will warm to the temps that this 'alteration' demands until the new 'equilibrium' is reached.

You know GW, I have a great deal of respect for your in-depth knowledge of the Arctic but it's when you come out with phrases such as the one above, that I shake my head in wonder.

Nostradamus and Mother Shipton spring to mind; you're presenting a prophecy as fact. Science progresses through research, not the use of crystal balls.

[Gray-Wolf]

OK J', lets try "all the evidence now points to us being in....." as opposed to "We are now in...."?

P.S. Thanks for the kind words!

EDIT: Finally a glimpse of the ice working it's way down the East coast of Greenland. Some of it looks quite extensive but ,you'll note, it's still melting out as it travels south.

http://www.woksat.in...-1142-e-sv.html

on the note of melting here's an image of S. Beaufort;

http://rapidfire.sci...213500.250m.jpg

you can see that there has been a 'fragmentation event' around the periphery of the ice which is now drifting towards the Alaskan/Canadian coast. If you look closely you'll see the tell tale signs of melt with the 'milky swirls' that this leaves. I wonder how many 100K 'extent' gains were borne out on this fragmentation?

Edited October 16, 2010 by Gray-Wolf

[WindWatcher]

OK J', lets try "all the evidence now points to us being in....." as opposed to "We are now in...."?

P.S. Thanks for the kind words!

EDIT: Finally a glimpse of the ice working it's way down the East coast of Greenland. Some of it looks quite extensive but ,you'll note, it's still melting out as it travels south.

http://www.woksat.in...-1142-e-sv.html

on the note of melting here's an image of S. Beaufort;

http://rapidfire.sci...213500.250m.jpg

you can see that there has been a 'fragmentation event' around the periphery of the ice which is now drifting towards the Alaskan/Canadian coast. If you look closely you'll see the tell tale signs of melt with the 'milky swirls' that this leaves. I wonder how many 100K 'extent' gains were borne out on this fragmentation?

These events you describe will have happened in the past and are not exceptional. Many 100k events past and present will have included such fragmentation and drifts.

[BornFromTheVoid]

IJIS has updated and todays gain is back above average at 114,000km2. It looks as though a large area of water around the Laptev and East Siberian sea is on the verge of freezing over very rapidly with pockets of patchy ice forming there over the last 2 days. We could potentially some very large daily gains if this does occur over the next day or so. The only problem is if slightly milder air and southerly winds reach the area before the freeze over can occur, which looks a possibility.

[NorthNorfolkWeather]

Why would the be brine filled snow? Please explain as I've always been told that rain, and snow is fresh water only, if it's landing on ice, then is should not be brine filled....

GW,

I repeat the question that you so nimbly skirted around

Why would the be brine filled snow? Please explain as I've always been told that rain, and snow is fresh water only, if it's landing on ice, then is should not be brine filled....

And salt water has a lower freezing point....

You know GW, I have a great deal of respect for your in-depth knowledge of the Arctic but it's when you come out with phrases such as the one above, that I shake my head in wonder.

Nostradamus and Mother Shipton spring to mind; you're presenting a prophecy as fact. Science progresses through research, not the use of crystal balls.

I couldn't agree more. Despite the changes done in a later post, the comment that GW made shows how he truly feels

[Gray-Wolf]

GW,

I repeat the question that you so nimbly skirted around

Why would the be brine filled snow? Please explain as I've always been told that rain, and snow is fresh water only, if it's landing on ice, then is should not be brine filled....

And salt water has a lower freezing point....

The " Brine filled snow is what occurs when snow cover is submerged and subsequently freezes. If you read up on the desalination of ice and what characteristics each 'ice type' has you'll probably understand better.

In the meantime I've root through my 'history' to see in what 'context' I leant of this 'new' ice type in the Basin.

The other point being how good an insulator snow cover is for the water below.

[BornFromTheVoid]

The IJIS figures have updated to give us our biggest gain this Autumn so far of about 148,000km2, which is still the lowest maximum daily October gain in the last 8 years. Anyway, this takes us over the 7 million mark and up to 4th lowest out of the last 8 years.

[Gray-Wolf]

I think we're approaching a perilous time for those who are graph watching. If we spend too long on 30 odd thousand days we'll be second lowest in no time!!! (and from there on any slow re-build drops us to lowest?)

We must now be at the point where the bits of ocean 'under sun' for the longest over summer are trying to freeze. Let's see how that goes?

[WindWatcher]

I think we're approaching a perilous time for those who are graph watching. If we spend too long on 30 odd thousand days we'll be second lowest in no time!!! (and from there on any slow re-build drops us to lowest?)

We must now be at the point where the bits of ocean 'under sun' for the longest over summer are trying to freeze. Let's see how that goes?

We are unlikely to spend more than a few hours on a "30 odd thousand day" as the second update will probably increase it dramatically as they have done every day for weeks. With the largest daily increase this month recorded just yesterday ~148,000 sqm, to suddenly start calling the situation perilous after only the first update of the day is alarmist!