Hot apocalyptic “eat” ice: so the polar ice cap is disappearing – Intelligonews

2016 will go down in history for the records the lowest winter maximum extent of Arctic ice cap , with an area of ​​14.5 million square meters: 20 thousand square kilometers less than the record set last year . In fact ever this year the Arctic ice cap has been reduced in winter.

Compared to the first measurements made 35 years ago by the satellites, the ‘ maximum extension of the sea ice to North pole has shrunk by 1.6 million square kilometers , wide area more than five times that of Italy.

The abnormal heat wave that has characterized this season has wowed also Mark Serreze , director of the NSIDC (National Snow and Ice data Center) of the University of Colorado at Boulder who along with NASA released data mentioned above. The heat hit latitudes especially in December , January and February with very abnormal temperatures, between 2:06 degrees above average in all regions . The most anomalous month, on a global scale, it has been to February: During this month the global temperature (land oceans +) was 1.21 degrees higher than the average of the twentieth century, thus becoming the hottest ever recorded in February 1880 .

Serreze has stated: “I have never seen in the Arctic region a winter so crazy and hot.” the data collected by the Institute US suggest that, on March 24, the icy surface of the Arctic has reached the maximum annual extension: 14,520,000 square kilometers. “the 13 smaller maximum extensions, according to satellite data, took place in the last 13 years . probably, “the atmospheric heat has contributed to this measurement of the lowest maximum extension, with air temperatures up to 10 degrees Fahrenheit above average at the edge of the pack ice where sea ice is thin.

“Even the winds in the Arctic during January and February were unfavorable for the growth of the ice because they brought warm air from the south and prevented the expansion of the coverage of ice.” negative Deficit they were recorded over most of the North Pole, except for Labrador Sea, Baffin Bay and Hudson Bay, with high peaks on the Barents Sea.

According to Walt Meier , scholar Sea ice at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, “the new negative record follows the record-breaking high temperatures that occurred in the months of December, January and February all over the world and in the region Arctic. “

Since 1979, the Arctic winter sea ice declined by 620,000 square miles , a twice the size of Texas. Each year the ice cap covering the Arctic ocean is reduced during the summer and then spread again in the winter, usually by touching its peak around March.