Snow And Ice In The Northern Hemisphere 2012/13

[bluearmy]

having flown back today from eastern china via scandinavia, i can confirm that the asian/scandi snowcover is impressive. can anyone post up what would be considered average for the time of year. just as we were looking for extensive october asian snowcover gains to generate feedback mechanisms re january SSW, i wonder if the current spring snowcover fits in with any ideas as we move from spring into summer.

[be cause]

hi, bluearmy,

 

http://moe.met.fsu.edu/snow/    is the only site I have found offering useful near real time snow cover data and analysis. Present NH snow cover is @10% above average.

 

In recent years cover has collapsed in spring .. last year falling to @30% below average at minimum This year is looking different ..

 

BFTV , GW  or others may offer more options (please) .. 

 

    be cause

[Polar Maritime]

Edited April 14, 2013 by Polar Maritime

[damianslaw]

Interesting to see how the snowline almost follows the southern russian border, with very little in Kazakhstan and Mongolia. There is a lot of sea ice in the Sea of Okhost, quite a strange pattern jutting out into the SE of the sea.

 

I'm not sure what the level of sea ice is at present, in recent years we have seen a marked decrease during April and especially May, thanks to extensive northern blocking and high pressure.

[BornFromTheVoid]

Looking at the link provided by "be cause", it seems snow cover has remained well above average this April.

 

Going by the Rutgers snow lab, we haven't seen a well above average April since the mid 90s... http://climate.rutgers.edu/snowcover/chart_anom.php?ui_set=1&ui_region=nhland&ui_month=4

Seems this April may buck the trend.

 

[DAVID SNOW]

March stats are now in, and snow cover was the 16th largest on record in the northern hemisphere

http://climate.rutge...gs.php?ui_set=1

In recent years, we've seen a very strong downward trend from April onward. So it will be interesting to see if that changes.

The monthly graphs can be viewed here http://climate.rutge...land&ui_month=5

Interesting indeed, and it  has changed.

[BornFromTheVoid]

April had the 9th largest snow cover out of the last 47 years

http://climate.rutgers.edu/snowcover/table_rankings.php?ui_set=1

 

 

[cheeky_monkey]

April had the 9th largest snow cover out of the last 47 years

http://climate.rutgers.edu/snowcover/table_rankings.php?ui_set=1

 

Mainly due to increased snow cover over North America and Canada...Eurasia came in around average

[cyclonic happiness]

Looks like the jet is lining up to wreck the summer again :-(

At least that means a nice snowy winter again, trouble is summer is getting squashed from both sides now for Europe.

This summer and winter will follow the trend................unfortunately :-(

[Costa Del Fal]

Looks like the jet is lining up to wreck the summer again :-(At least that means a nice snowy winter again, trouble is summer is getting squashed from both sides now for Europe.This summer and winter will follow the trend................unfortunately :-(

Come on thats such a very pessimistic view. We cant expect a totally high pressure dominated summer. Look at May 2006!

[be cause]

And now it's snowing and lying at Longyearbyen !

[cyclonic happiness]

Come on thats such a very pessimistic view. We cant expect a totally high pressure dominated summer. Look at May 2006!

the pattern looks to be here again.A summer like spell of weather with next to no rain for a few weeks and then the jet stream plonks itself over us for a huge wedge of summer.In fact it hasn't really got any further north than it is atm at this time of the year and the summers of the past few years.

[BornFromTheVoid]

Snow cover has fallen below average over the last week, the first time since early February.

 

 

I wonder if this going to follow the trend of recent summers (albeit, slightly delayed) and plummet close to record lows from now until mid October?

Edited May 12, 2013 by BornFromTheVoid

[cooling climate]

Early days but Arctic sea ice looking fairly healthy at the moment. I see NSIDC figures differ

somewhat but that is unsurprising.

After the unusual Arctic storm last August played havoc with the ice it will be interesting to

see how it fares this summer/autumn.The Arctic this year seems in no hurry to warm up

and what with  the last few model outputs showing this trend continuing it could be a more

optimistic start to the melt season.

The high Arctic had a coolish summer season last year and may very well do again. that

would be my call anyway.

[BornFromTheVoid]

Third lowest May snow cover on record

 

 

http://climate.rutgers.edu/snowcover/table_rankings.php?ui_set=1

[be cause]

My first year watching the snow disappear ..I was hoping for a recovery .. a negative anomaly of 4 million sq kms is scarcely that ! A new extreme seasonality to NH snow seems firmly established

[BornFromTheVoid]

My first year watching the snow disappear ..I was hoping for a recovery .. a negative anomaly of 4 million sq kms is scarcely that ! A new extreme seasonality to NH snow seems firmly established

 

Certainly seems like we're in quite a seesaw pattern. It won't stop calls of a new ice age coming again when we see the next above average readings in October or November though.

 

June is starting out well below average too

[be cause]

And now according to Cryosphere Today a fall of 410000 sq kms in 2 days in NH sea ice !

[be cause]

770000 sq km in 7 days ...

[cooling climate]

Early days still but with temps low over the high arctic especially and a cold spring

up there behind us we are not seeing the rapid melt that we saw last year.

Of course there is a long way to until the end of the melt season and although a

low minimum extent is again likely due in part  to the loss from last year I personally

do not think we will see such low area and extent as we saw last year. Unless of

course we see another major Arctic storm again.

The high Arctic had a coolish summer last year and it will be interesting to see if it

is repeated again this year especially with a cold start to summer as we are seeing.

 

[sebastiaan1973]

I think it doesn't matter it's a little bit cooler. Lot of the sea ice is thin. It will melt anyway during the summer. But I can be wrong

[Methuselah]

But don't forget about the cherry-pickers: http://www.skepticalscience.com/Articgate-perpetuating-myth-Arctic-sea-ice-recovered.html

[cooling climate]

I think it doesn't matter it's a little bit cooler. Lot of the sea ice is thin. It will melt anyway during the summer. But I can be wrong

I was not implying that it did but it would still be a trend in the right direction.

[sebastiaan1973]

In my opinion there is only one trend; downwards. Year on year there might be some differences, on the long term the seaextent and more important volume is going down. Unfortunately we can do nothing about it.

[be cause]

CT area down 999000 sq km in 7 days and snow anomaly @ 14% below average...

 

I now predict that the CT Arctic ice anomaly graph will have insufficient depth to show conditions later this summer !