Snow & Ice coverage in the Northern Hemisphere Winter 2021/22

[Northernlights]

Fine  clear sunset tonight  at 5c with no contrails to spoil it. A bit of science to back up my belief that lack of aircraft is getting the seasons back on track.

Contrails: How tweaking flight plans can help the climate

WWW.BBC.CO.UK

---

Why experts say cutting contrails costs less than $1bn a year but may be worth so much more.

 

Up here we certainly had a cold winter last year in January and February with a  very traditional late north of Scotland  cold spring followed by a fine summer. Feel its also helping to cool the Arctic as well. The cold seems to have arrived all at once in the last two days.

[DavidS]

USNIC has updated, Big westward coverage of snow.

 

[BLAST FROM THE PAST]

10 hours ago, Northernlights said:

Fine  clear sunset tonight  at 5c with no contrails to spoil it. A bit of science to back up my belief that lack of aircraft is getting the seasons back on track.

Contrails: How tweaking flight plans can help the climate

WWW.BBC.CO.UK

---

Why experts say cutting contrails costs less than $1bn a year but may be worth so much more.

 

Up here we certainly had a cold winter last year in January and February with a  very traditional late north of Scotland  cold spring followed by a fine summer. Feel its also helping to cool the Arctic as well. The cold seems to have arrived all at once in the last two days.

One thing I have noticed is how quickly it ‘feels’ cool when the sun dips…and not just recently.  Even the warm spells the evenings seem to cool quickly.
 

BFTP 

[BLAST FROM THE PAST]

2 hours ago, DavidS said:

USNIC has updated, Big westward coverage of snow.

 

How does it compare to last year?  Also I think there’ll be a massive expanse over the next week or so

 

BFTP

[Bobd29]

1 hour ago, BLAST FROM THE PAST said:

How does it compare to last year?  Also I think there’ll be a massive expanse over the next week or so

 

BFTP

Looking good in Scandi after some melt in the next few days, northern areas look solid now.

Fred are you attempting a LRF this year? Hope you are well.

[Don]

4 hours ago, DavidS said:

USNIC has updated, Big westward coverage of snow.

 

That's pretty impressive I think!

[Premiere Neige]

4 hours ago, BLAST FROM THE PAST said:

How does it compare to last year?  Also I think there’ll be a massive expanse over the next week or so

 

BFTP

I believe we're a good way ahead on ice this year, can't remember how the snow coverage was...

[BLAST FROM THE PAST]

2 hours ago, Bobd29 said:

Looking good in Scandi after some melt in the next few days, northern areas look solid now.

Fred are you attempting a LRF this year? Hope you are well.

Been a very tough Summer mate, lost 3 close friends (known them for between 32 - 50 years) to the big C.  
At this stage no plans to do one but the La Nina could play a big part in the direction we head.

 

best regards

 

BFTP

[BLAST FROM THE PAST]

1 minute ago, Premier Neige said:

I believe we're a good way ahead on ice this year, can't remember how the snow coverage was...

Thanks
 

BFTP

[Methuselah]

13 minutes ago, BLAST FROM THE PAST said:

Been a very tough Summer mate, lost 3 close friends (known them for between 32 - 50 years) to the big C.  
At this stage no plans to do one but the La Nina could play a big part in the direction we head.

 

best regards

 

BFTP

Sorry to hear that, Fred.

[Midlands Ice Age]

19 hours ago, Northernlights said:

Fine  clear sunset tonight  at 5c with no contrails to spoil it. A bit of science to back up my belief that lack of aircraft is getting the seasons back on track.

Contrails: How tweaking flight plans can help the climate

WWW.BBC.CO.UK

---

Why experts say cutting contrails costs less than $1bn a year but may be worth so much more.

 

Up here we certainly had a cold winter last year in January and However on thinking about it with a  very traditional late north of Scotland  cold spring followed by a fine summer. Feel its also helping to cool the Arctic as well. The cold seems to have arrived all at once in the last two days.

NL..

Not sure of any  connection myself.

However.......... on thinking about it, and the chart I produced yesterday started me thinking.... 

Clearly there is some seasonal/solar  entity in this chart -

It is thought that Sept is the most sensitive month to changes in the formation of ice, with it being right at the balance between freezing and melt seasons.

The above works out at about 22 years for a total cycle.

Now the only thing  I can think of with a cycle of this amplitude is the solar itself.

Here we know a cycle of roughly 11 years from one so called minimum to the next is in operation.

Again you can say 'no connection' - as the I/R impact is negligible we are told. (less than 1% is the usual figure quoted).

 

But yesterday I came across this chart from a respected scientist who produces data from the Bremen monitoring site from satellites.

It shows the variation in UV from the solar cycle over the period over the last 5 cycles.

As can be seen a variation of about 10-25% in the strength during the cycle is occuring , but a change of around  10% has/is occured in max U/V during the total period  (assuming this cycle continues on its current trend) .

 

Again I hear you say so what...

 

Well.......... as we all know Ozone protects us all from Xray and U/V.

Ozone is mainly produced in the Stratosphere and there are reports  of big unexpected changes coming from the Antarctic continent over the last few years. We have also seen large variations in Ozone at the north Pole the last couple  of years. Which I have been monitoring on here.

Perhaps we have come to a tipping point for the production of Ozone?

Remember that Ozone gets removed under the effects of U/V and very cold (-80C) temperatures such as is sometimes found in the stratosphere. . 

So could the fact that we are currently apparently losing U/V from the sun be causing  chemical changes to the chemical reactions which are happening in the Stratosphere?

 Changing the balance of chemicals up there is thought to effect temperatures by virtue of changing the heat loss into space, and is also thought to effect cloud formulation in the atmosphere below, by means of the nucleation effect on particles in the lower atmosphere.. (More X/Rays and Gamma Rays getting through).

So where do the aircraft park most of their exhaust fumes?

You've guessed it into the Stratosphere.

The jets produce volumes of water vapor, carbon oxides and unburned fuels into the stratosphere.

 So it may be that there is a connection....

I intend monitoring the Ozone in the stratosphere in the northern hemisphere this year.

Let see what develops?

Pure speculation on my part.... mind.

MIA

  

 

 

 

 

[Midlands Ice Age]

After my speculations above, more fact from Masie..

 Good to see that USNIC is back.

My access isn't back yet though. 

Masie today has another century increase despite some perhaps unexpected losses.

 Masie total extent is reported as 7,728K Km2.  An increase of (+152K Km2).

ESS lost (-7K) after its exceptional rises over the last couple of weeks. It is now nearly full.

Beaufort (+6K) and Chukchi (+9K), both gained following yesterdays  losses.

Laptev (+42K) is still going for a rapid fill up, but, as I suggested yesterday may happen, Kara took up the running (+67K).

Barents continued to expand with (+11K).

Although Greenland fell (-7K), all the 'western' areas gained with Baffin (+26K), CAA (+26K), Hudson and CAB (both +2K).

2021 has now moved to the top of ice extent charts  for the last 5 years on the DMI charts. 

Also worthy of note to browse the area graphs - 

https://nsidc.org/data/masie/masie_plots

MIA

 

 

Edited October 23, 2021 by Midlands Ice Age

[damianslaw]

Quite a rapid expanse westward especially into Scandi. One theory goes if their is a sudden expanse in late October westward this can have feedbacks for promoting large Siberian highs which can help increase chance if cold in northern hemisphere mid latitudes but either for N America or Europe sometimes both sometimes just for one. Also perhaps more important for us is coverage in Scandi. Last time their was early good snow cover build up their was 2009... it's just one of many factors though and the coming days could see it nibbled away by warmer air from the south... 

[BLAST FROM THE PAST]

Very Interesting stuff lads, keep it coming

 

BFTP

[Northernlights]

On 23/10/2021 at 17:25, Midlands Ice Age said:

NL..

Not sure of any  connection myself.

However.......... on thinking about it, and the chart I produced yesterday started me thinking.... 

Clearly there is some seasonal/solar  entity in this chart -

It is thought that Sept is the most sensitive month to changes in the formation of ice, with it being right at the balance between freezing and melt seasons.

The above works out at about 22 years for a total cycle.

Now the only thing  I can think of with a cycle of this amplitude is the solar itself.

Here we know a cycle of roughly 11 years from one so called minimum to the next is in operation.

Again you can say 'no connection' - as the I/R impact is negligible we are told. (less than 1% is the usual figure quoted).

 

But yesterday I came across this chart from a respected scientist who produces data from the Bremen monitoring site from satellites.

It shows the variation in UV from the solar cycle over the period over the last 5 cycles.

As can be seen a variation of about 10-25% in the strength during the cycle is occuring , but a change of around  10% has/is occured in max U/V during the total period  (assuming this cycle continues on its current trend) .

 

Again I hear you say so what...

 

Well.......... as we all know Ozone protects us all from Xray and U/V.

Ozone is mainly produced in the Stratosphere and there are reports  of big unexpected changes coming from the Antarctic continent over the last few years. We have also seen large variations in Ozone at the north Pole the last couple  of years. Which I have been monitoring on here.

Perhaps we have come to a tipping point for the production of Ozone?

Remember that Ozone gets removed under the effects of U/V and very cold (-80C) temperatures such as is sometimes found in the stratosphere. . 

So could the fact that we are currently apparently losing U/V from the sun be causing  chemical changes to the chemical reactions which are happening in the Stratosphere?

 Changing the balance of chemicals up there is thought to effect temperatures by virtue of changing the heat loss into space, and is also thought to effect cloud formulation in the atmosphere below, by means of the nucleation effect on particles in the lower atmosphere.. (More X/Rays and Gamma Rays getting through).

So where do the aircraft park most of their exhaust fumes?

You've guessed it into the Stratosphere.

The jets produce volumes of water vapor, carbon oxides and unburned fuels into the stratosphere.

 So it may be that there is a connection....

I intend monitoring the Ozone in the stratosphere in the northern hemisphere this year.

Let see what develops?

Pure speculation on my part.... mind.

MIA

  

MIA thank you for that not so sure its speculation though.

 

 

 

 

[bobbydog]

11 hours ago, BLAST FROM THE PAST said:

How does it compare to last year?  Also I think there’ll be a massive expanse over the next week or so

 

BFTP

Not much in it compared to last year regarding snow, maybe a bit less. Not really an issue at this stage, so long as it advances into scandi (which it is..) Arctic ice is much better though.

Last year-

This year-

[Midlands Ice Age]

BFTP...

 Welcome back.

 Sorry about your mates.

I was wondering what you would make of the current ice expansion.

 MIA 

 

[Lincs Observation]

4 minutes ago, bobbydog said:

Not much in it compared to last year regarding snow, maybe a bit less. Not really an issue at this stage, so long as it advances into scandi (which it is..) Arctic ice is much better though.

Last year-

This year-

What is noticeable is more snow further south over the Himalayan mountains, and less over Alaska and Newfoundland, looks like a shift but time will tell I guess.

LO

[bobbydog]

Just for comparison, here are the same dates for 2009, 2010 and 2012. (3 winters with memorable snow events)

2009-

2010-

2012-

I don't think we can draw any conclusions from these really, just a case of wait and see... 

[BLAST FROM THE PAST]

2 hours ago, Midlands Ice Age said:

BFTP...

 Welcome back.

 Sorry about your mates.

I was wondering what you would make of the current ice expansion.

 MIA 

 

I think there’s a 60 yr cycle re Atlantisation and it ended in 2019, and we will see a rapid ice recovery over next decade.  Maybe we see this starting to pan out….maybe.  I think we are seeing signs of serious cold pooling early on and it spilling into the northern continents….something to watch imo

 

BFTP

[BLAST FROM THE PAST]

2 hours ago, bobbydog said:

Not much in it compared to last year regarding snow, maybe a bit less. Not really an issue at this stage, so long as it advances into scandi (which it is..) Arctic ice is much better though.

Last year-

This year-

Ice expansion is massive (big impact imo down the line…it’s really cold up

there due to the end of 60 yr cycle…no more Atlantisation for 60

yrs approx…rapid ice recovery anticipated), anticipation of massive snow increases next couple of weeks.

Edited October 23, 2021 by BLAST FROM THE PAST

[summer blizzard]

Statistically speaking it's the snow cover south of 60N which is important to the AO feedback so actually the current pattern is probably not good Vs a year like 2012.

That said the SAI has not performed well, 2016 was notably stellar and flopped.

[damianslaw]

48 minutes ago, summer blizzard said:

Statistically speaking it's the snow cover south of 60N which is important to the AO feedback so actually the current pattern is probably not good Vs a year like 2012.

That said the SAI has not performed well, 2016 was notably stellar and flopped.

2009 was poor on that front and returned coldest winter since 78-79. Also to an extent 2010.

[bobbydog]

1 hour ago, summer blizzard said:

Statistically speaking it's the snow cover south of 60N which is important to the AO feedback so actually the current pattern is probably not good Vs a year like 2012.

That said the SAI has not performed well, 2016 was notably stellar and flopped.

As you say, Cohen's SAI theory hasn't really held up. From my observations over the years, the advance of snow cover into Western Europe, regardless of how much is south of 60N, has been more important for the UK.

[Bobd29]

12 hours ago, BLAST FROM THE PAST said:

Been a very tough Summer mate, lost 3 close friends (known them for between 32 - 50 years) to the big C.  
At this stage no plans to do one but the La Nina could play a big part in the direction we head.

 

best regards

 

BFTP

Sorry to hear that Fred, puts a lot of life’s ‘challenges’ into perspective.