Latest Sea ice Stories

As Arctic sea-ice recedes inexorably towards another record summer minimum, scientists have highlighted the exceptional contribution that satellites have made to the International Polar Year and charting the effects of climate change.Celebrating the remarkable accomplishments of the International Polar Year (IPY), the IPY Oslo Science Conference last week drew together 2400 researchers, educators and members of northern communities "“ making it the biggest polar science meeting ever...

North America, Europe and eastern Asia could see more cold, moist and snowy winters much like the one that just passed, according to one top scientist. James Overland of the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) told the AFP news agency, "Cold and snowy winters will be the rule rather than the exception." It may seem counter-intuitive, but warmer Arctic climates caused by climate change influence air pressure at the North Pole, which shifts wind patterns in such a way...

NASA's first dedicated oceanographic field campaign goes to sea next week to take an up-close look at how changing conditions in the Arctic are affecting the ocean's chemistry and ecosystems that play a critical role in global climate change.The ICESCAPE mission, which stands for "Impacts of Climate on Ecosystems and Chemistry of the Arctic Pacific Environment," will investigate the impacts of climate change on the ecology and biogeochemistry of the Chukchi and Beaufort seas along...

WASHINGTON, June 8 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- NASA's first dedicated oceanographic field campaign goes to sea June 15 to take an up-close look at how changing conditions in the Arctic are affecting the ocean's chemistry and ecosystems that play a critical role in global climate change. (Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20081007/38461LOGO) The "Impacts of Climate on Ecosystems and Chemistry of the Arctic Pacific Environment" mission, or ICESCAPE, will investigate the impacts of...

NASA's first dedicated oceanographic field campaign goes to sea June 15 to take an up-close look at how changing conditions in the Arctic are affecting the ocean's chemistry and ecosystems that play a critical role in global climate change.The "Impacts of Climate on Ecosystems and Chemistry of the Arctic Pacific Environment" mission, or ICESCAPE, will investigate the impacts of climate change on the ecology and biogeochemistry of the Chukchi and Beaufort seas. A key focus is how...

Less ice covers the Arctic today than at any time in recent geologic history.That's the conclusion of an international group of researchers, who have compiled the first comprehensive history of Arctic ice.For decades, scientists have strived to collect sediment cores from the difficult-to-access Arctic Ocean floor, to discover what the Arctic was like in the past. Their most recent goal: to bring a long-term perspective to the ice loss we see today.Now, in an upcoming issue of Quarternary...

Melting sea ice has been shown to be a major cause of warming in the Arctic, according to a University of Melbourne, Australia study.Findings published in Nature today reveal the rapid melting of sea ice has dramatically increased the levels of warming in the region in the last two decades.Lead author Dr James Screen of the School of Earth Sciences at the University of Melbourne says the increased Arctic warming was due to a positive feedback between sea ice melting and atmospheric...

Scientists have discovered that changes in the amount of ice floating in the polar oceans are causing sea levels to rise.The research, published this week in Geophysical Research Letters, is the first assessment of how quickly floating ice is being lost today.According to Archimedes' principle, any floating object displaces its own weight of fluid. For example, an ice cube in a glass of water does not cause the glass to overflow as it melts.But because sea water is warmer and more salty than...

Rate of ice-cap melt has been accelerating since 1985Close to 50 years of data show the Devon Island ice cap, one of the largest ice masses in the Canadian High Arctic, is thinning and shrinking.A paper published in the March edition of Arctic, the journal of the University of Calgary's Arctic Institute of North America, reports that between 1961 and 1985, the ice cap grew in some years and shrank in others, resulting in an overall loss of mass. But that changed 1985 when scientists began to...

The U.S. National Snow and Ice Data Center reports that the extent of sea ice over the Arctic Ocean grew until the last day of March, which is the latest the annual melting season has begun in 31 years of satellite records. The center said in a statement on Wednesday that cold weather and winds from the north over the Bering Sea and Barents Sea meant the area of ocean covered by ice expanded through last month.  That is two days later than in 1999, the previous latest start to a melting...