October 27th, 2019: Antarctic sea ice extent ***********************
Arctic sea ice began its autumn regrowth in the last 12 days of September, with the ice edge expanding along a broad front in the western Arctic Ocean. Overall, the summer of 2019 was exceptionally warm, with repeated pulses of very warm air from northern Siberia and the Bering Strait.
Overview of conditions
Arctic sea ice extent for September averaged 4.32 million square kilometers (1.67 million square miles), the third lowest in the 41-year continuous satellite record, behind 2012 and 2007. This is 750,000 square kilometers (290,000 square miles) above the record low set in September 2012, and 2.09 million square kilometers (807,000 square miles) below the 1981 to 2010 average. Following the minimum seasonal extent, which occurred on September 18 and tied for second lowest in the satellite record, rapid growth ensued along the ice edge in the northern Beaufort, Chukchi, East Siberian, and eastern Laptev Seas (Figure 1b). Winds from the south caused a small area of continued ice retreat in the western Laptev and Kara Seas, offsetting some of the ice expansion. There was also growth in the Canadian Archipelago and offshore northwest of Greenland, with some expansion caused by drift to the northeast of Greenland. The Northern Sea Route appeared to still be open at the end of September.
Image courtesy of the National Snow and Ice Data Center, University of Colorado, Boulder (https://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/). Data source see http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/about-the-data/
