Mid-Nov. 2023 Arctic Ice Grows to 10 Wadhams

The animation shows the rapid growth of Arctic ice extent during November 2023, from day 304 to yesterday, day 319.  For all of the fuss over the September minimum, little is said about Arctic ice growing back rapidly; that’s 4 Wadhams in October, plus another 1.3M in Nov to total 10M km2, or 10 Wadhams.  The Russian side on the left froze over in October, and now at the center bottom you can see Beaufort sea and Canadian Archipelago icing up. Center right is Baffin Bay growing ice as well.

The graph below shows the last 30 days of 2023 compared to the 17 year average (2006 to 2022 inclusive), to SII (Sea Ice Index) and some notable years.

 

From Mid October to Mid November 2023, MASIE shows NH ice extent growing from 6.3 M km2 to 10M.  That matches 2022 and exceeds the 17 year average by more than 200K km2.   SII (Sea Ice Index) is only slightly lower.

The table below shows the distribution of ice in the Arctic Ocean basins.

Region 2023319 Day 319 Ave. 2023-Ave. 2007319 2023-2007
 (0) Northern_Hemisphere 9997068 9784253  212815  9737614 259454 
 (1) Beaufort_Sea 1051194 1063450  -12257  1053727 -2533 
 (2) Chukchi_Sea 596947 629695  -32748  503783 93164 
 (3) East_Siberian_Sea 1064913 1075985  -11072  1043952 20960 
 (4) Laptev_Sea 897845 897217  628  897845
 (5) Kara_Sea 696199 658489  37710  765376 -69177 
 (6) Barents_Sea 245998 154920  91078  145438 100560 
 (7) Greenland_Sea 613312 460620  152692  527575 85737 
 (8) Baffin_Bay_Gulf_of_St._Lawrence 536576 526706  9870  533931 2645 
 (9) Canadian_Archipelago 841536 850736  -9200  852539 -11003 
 (10) Hudson_Bay 161371 234076  -72704  231544 -70173 
 (11) Central_Arctic 3236821 3174741  62081  3156228 80594 

Overall ice extent has 212k km2 above average or 2%.  The only sizeable deficit is in Hudson Bay,  more than offset by surpluses elsewhere, especiallly in Greenland and Barents seas, along with the Central Arctic.

 

 

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