August 11 Arctic Ice Report

The extent of Arctic ice fell to a new wintertime low in March 2017. But springtime ice persisted and extents since June are hanging around the decadal average. Below shows the last 27 days through yesterday, August 11, 2017.

For this period 2017 was mostly average or higher, continuing into August. This year is now almost 300k km2 greater than 2016 and exceeds 2007 by 600k km2. SII 2017 is also 600k km2 lower.

As we shall see, this year’s extents are in surplus on the Atlantic side, offset by deficits on the Pacific side and in Hudson Bay. The image compares day 223 with the same day in 2007.

The Table compares 2017 day 223 ice extents with the decadal average and 2007.

Region	2017223	Day 223 Average	2017-Ave.	2007223	2017-2007
(0) Northern_Hemisphere	6295153	6338630	-43477	5690646	604507
(1) Beaufort_Sea	646803	740583	-93779	767724	-120921
(2) Chukchi_Sea	342601	479258	-136657	261771	80831
(3) East_Siberian_Sea	411714	663564	-251849	207590	204124
(4) Laptev_Sea	430221	329873	100349	310764	119458
(5) Kara_Sea	140411	123400	17011	215854	-75443
(6) Barents_Sea	60001	28883	31118	15996	44005
(7) Greenland_Sea	236735	253185	-16450	286393	-49658
(8) Baffin_Bay_Gulf_of_St._Lawrence	207230	71011	136219	83942	123288
(9) Canadian_Archipelago	527348	439371	87977	361883	165465
(10) Hudson_Bay	70437	87621	-17184	94262	-23825
(11) Central_Arctic	3220493	3120642	99851	3083211	137282

Deficits to average are in the BCE region, and surpluses appear almost everywhere else. Ice is particularly strong in Laptev, Baffin, CAA and the Central Arctic.

The graph below shows Barents this year continues to be above average but fell behind the record year of 2014. After pausing at 70K km2, it dipped to 50k km2, then bounced back to 60k yesterday.

The black line is average for the last 11 years. 2007 in purple appears close to an average year. 2014 had the highest annual extent in Barents Sea, due to higher and later maximums, holding onto ice during the summer, and recovering quickly. In contrast, 2016 was the lowest annual extent, melting out early and recovering later. 2017 in blue started out way behind, but grew rapidly to reach average, and then persisted longer to exceed even 2014. It will be important to see when the recovery of ice begins.

For more on why Barents Sea matters see Barents Icicles