18 September 2019

Arctic Sea Ice Melt May be 2nd Lowest On Record

Posted by Dan Satterfield

The summer melt of the Arctic sea ice is nearly done and the numbers are flirting with being the 2nd lowest on record. 2012  is the lowest and this year will not be as low but still at alarming levels. The real change is the loss of the multi ice that lasts from year to year. This “old” ice is nearly gone and you can see it disappear in this animation from NASA:

The ice levels now are likely the lowest in the last 1500 years according to a 2011 paper in Nature. 

Here is the Arctic Sea Ice Extent from the NSIDC. Note that this year is the blue line.