The animation shows the last two weeks of Arctic ice recovery from November 29 to December 13, 2022. On the lower far right, Hudson Bay starts this period at 550k km2 ice extent and grows to 1.2M km2 (from 44% to 96% of its maximum). On the far left Sea of Okhotsk starts with 42k km2 and grows to 380k km2 of ice extent, now at 45% of its max last March. In the center Beaufort Sea reaches its max.
The graph below shows Mid December daily ice extents for 2022 compared to 16 year averages, and some years of note. As of yesterday, Arctic ice extent topped 12 Wadhams, or 12M km2.
The black line shows so far during this period on average Arctic ice extents increased ~1.0M km2, while 2022 (cyan line) started December 200k km2 in deficit, reaching then holding a surplus to average for the last six days. The Sea Ice Index in orange (SII from NOAA) lagged MASIE this month, but also topped 12M km2 on day 247. Both 2007 and 2020 had much lower extents early in December, making up most of the deficit later on.
Why is this important? All the claims of global climate emergency depend on dangerously higher temperatures, lower sea ice, and rising sea levels. The lack of additional warming is documented in a post Still No Global Warming March 2022
The lack of acceleration in sea levels along coastlines has been discussed also. See USCS Warnings of Coastal Flooding
Also, a longer term perspective is informative:
The table below shows the distribution of Sea Ice on day 347 across the Arctic Regions, on average, this year and 2007.
| Region | 2022347 | Day 347 Average | 2022-Ave. | 2007347 | 2022-2007 |
| (0) Northern_Hemisphere | 12151093 | 12003311 | 147782 | 11428288 | 722805 |
| (1) Beaufort_Sea | 1070966 | 1069874 | 1092 | 1062676 | 8290 |
| (2) Chukchi_Sea | 895943 | 906386 | -10443 | 677993 | 217949 |
| (3) East_Siberian_Sea | 1087137 | 1085009 | 2129 | 1053584 | 33553 |
| (4) Laptev_Sea | 897845 | 897835 | 10 | 897845 | 0 |
| (5) Kara_Sea | 801884 | 845212 | -43328 | 800920 | 964 |
| (6) Barents_Sea | 221598 | 331366 | -109768 | 236964 | -15366 |
| (7) Greenland_Sea | 587354 | 544864 | 42489 | 488595 | 98758 |
| (8) Baffin_Bay_Gulf_of_St._Lawrence | 792277 | 806543 | -14266 | 782889 | 9388 |
| (9) Canadian_Archipelago | 854843 | 853331 | 1512 | 852556 | 2286 |
| (10) Hudson_Bay | 1203872 | 1046825 | 157047 | 1209339 | -5467 |
| (11) Central_Arctic | 3214028 | 3204979 | 9049 | 3186190 | 27837 |
| (12) Bering_Sea | 119070 | 225887 | -106817 | 54836 | 64234 |
| (13) Baltic_Sea | 11482 | 9900 | 1582 | 2898 | 8584 |
| (14) Sea_of_Okhotsk | 379132 | 166880 | 212251 | 119667 | 259464 |
The overall surplus to average is 148k km2, (2%). Main deficits in Bering and Barents seas are more than offset by surpluses elsewhere, especially Okhotsk and Hudson Bay. 2022 ice extent exceeds that of 2007 by 3/4 Wadham, most of the difference being in Chukchi and Okhotsk.
Illustration by Eleanor Lutz shows Earth’s seasonal climate changes. If played in full screen, the four corners present views from top, bottom and sides. It is a visual representation of scientific datasets measuring Arctic ice extents.
Science Matters 
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