Arctic sea ice has retreated dramatically over the 44-year satellite record. The Antarctic has been under constant watch by scientists using measurements on the ground, air and from satellites, to assess the most detailed look at ice thickness.
And now there is currently less sea ice in the Antarctic than at any time in the four decades since the beginning of satellite observation.
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Researchers from the Alfred Wegener Institute and the University of Bremen have just reported virtually ice-free conditions in its current research area, the Bellingshausen Sea.
In early February 2023, only 1,367,000 square miles of the Southern Ocean were covered with sea ice surpassing last year’s previous record minimum set in February 2022.
The ice may continue to shrink through the end of February according to Christian Haas, Head of the Sea Ice Physics Section at the Alfred Wegener Institute, Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research.
Professor Haas says “The rapid decline in sea ice over the past six years is quite remarkable since the ice cover hardly changed at all in the thirty-five years before. It is still unclear whether what we are seeing is the beginning of a rapid end to summer sea ice in the Antarctic, or if it is merely the beginning of a new phase characterized by low but still stable sea ice cover in the summer.”
Record low sea ice cover in the Antarctica: Sea ice extent in the Southern Ocean now the lowest since the beginning of satellite observation forty years ago.😕
Posted by Alfred Wegener Institute, Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research on Friday, February 10, 2023
The melting has progressed since December 2022, and the West Antarctic is virtually ice-free where the research vessel Polarstern is sailing.
According to expedition leader and AWI geophysicist Prof Karsten Gohl, who is now in the region for the seventh time, having first come in 1994: “I have never seen such an extreme, ice-free situation here before. The continental shelf, an area the size of Germany, is now completely ice-free..”
In the course of the year, the Antarctic sea ice generally reaches its maximum extent in September or October and its minimum extent in February.
In some regions, the sea ice melts completely in summer. In winter, the cold climate throughout the Antarctic promotes the rapid formation of new sea ice.
At its maximum, the sea ice cover in the Antarctic is generally between 18 and 20 million square kilometres.
In summer, it dwindles to roughly 3 million square kilometres, displaying far more natural annual variability than ice in the Arctic.