{"id":12969,"date":"2012-08-26T10:45:58","date_gmt":"2012-08-26T15:45:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.realclimate.org\/?p=12969"},"modified":"2012-08-28T01:21:20","modified_gmt":"2012-08-28T06:21:20","slug":"an-update-on-the-arctic-sea-ice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.realclimate.org\/index.php\/archives\/2012\/08\/an-update-on-the-arctic-sea-ice\/","title":{"rendered":"An update on the Arctic sea-ice"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

We noted<\/a> earlier that the Artic sea-ice is approaching a record minimum. The record is now broken, almost a month before the annual sea-ice minima usually is observed, and there is probably more melting in store before it reaches the minimum for 2012 – before the autumn sea-ice starts to form. <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The figure shows annual variations in the area of sea-ice extent, and the x-axis marks the time of the year, starting on January 1st and ending on December 31st (for the individual years). The grey curves show the Arctic sea-ice extent in all previous years, and the red curve shows the sea-ice area for 2012. <\/p>\n

(The figure is plotted with an R-script<\/a> that takes the data directly from NSIDC<\/a>; the R-environment is available from CRAN<\/a>)<\/p>\n

UPDATE on the update<\/b> The National Snow and Ice Data Center announced today (August 27th, 2012)<\/a> that the 2007 record has now been broken by their more conservative 5-day running average criterion. They also note that “The six lowest ice extents in the satellite record have occurred in the last six years (2007 to 2012).”<\/b><\/p>\n\n<\/div> ","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We noted earlier that the Artic sea-ice is approaching a record minimum. The record is now broken, almost a month before the annual sea-ice minima usually is observed, and there is probably more melting in store before it reaches the minimum for 2012 – before the autumn sea-ice starts to form. The figure shows annual […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12969","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-climate-science","entry"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t