Ron Clutz writes at Climate Change Dispatch:

Arctic Sea Ice Surges Back During First Half of October

Consider the refreezing during the first half of October through yesterday, adding an average of 96k km2 per day. On the left side, the Laptev Sea has filled in, and just below it, the East Siberian Sea is also growing fast ice from the shore to meet refreezing drift ice.

Animation of NSIDC’s MASIE extent data via Google Earth by Ron Clutz. See note below for source of data.

At the top Kara, Barents and Greenland’s seas are all growing ice. At the bottom, Canadian Archipelago is now full of ice.

The graph compares extents over the first 15 days of October.

Read more here: http://ift.tt/2xNQj1k

NOTES:Data from NSIDC’s MASIE sea ice extent data set. Details here: http://ift.tt/2kWtfaK

Google Earth KMZ files of the data are also available here: http://ift.tt/2xMze89

NSIDC’s interactive sea-ice extent chart comparing the last 5 years of extent to today shows that the current rate of recovery is doing pretty well:

While this fast refreezing growth is interesting, it doesn’t necessary predict the rest of the freeze and melt season, which are highly dependent on the vagaries of wind and weather.