ORH_wxman

PIOMAS updated mid-month...the minimum occurred on Sept 11th with a volume of 4,542 cubic km. This was 4th lowest...slightly below 2010 which was 4,582 cubic km. 2012, 2011, and 2016 finished lower.

Yeah I'm skeptical we'd get there again...maybe if we got 3 flukish slow melt years and maybe one or two colder winters mixed in we'd see some much higher min...but even then I'm not sure. We had a lot of mulityear ice back then. We'd really need to replenish it over 4-6 years and that isn't easy in the current state. We started to do it after 2012 but we saw most of it get destroyed during the epic July 2015 pattern. Realistically, I think we would need another Pinatubo eruption to get back around 6 million sq km. We'd prob drop Arctic temps by about 1-2C for a couple years which might be enough for big temporary rebound.

The extent/area has def stabilized since 2007...basically flat trends. Volume is still def trending down since 2007 (though flat or even slightly up since 2010). What we need to rebuild volume more is a colder winter mixed in between two slower melt years...we've had really warm winters recently. 2012-2013 was the last winter that was def colder...more toward climo. It probably helped with the 2013 rebound after the epic 2012...that, and the cold summer of course...that's why we got a min above 5 million sq km right after the record low.

Yeah that was a great storm actually. It produced a decent number of power outages in E MA. 10-12" of pure cement.

Yeah mid-winter retention was disappointing...we had snow cover most of the time, but it kept getting thinned pretty bad before the next one....until Feb vacation week of course when it decided to turn into June for a week. The good retention pattern didn't occur until March...and by then, you're fighting the sliding climo. But that Mar 9-Mar 20th period def had a pretty deep winter feel...and the Mar 20-Apr 3rd period was more like waning winter feel...snow took a while to go...got that replenisher on April 1st.

That storm was pretty solid in Natick...about 8 inches. Around 6 inches in ORH. It just sucked that it vaporized like 3-4 days later. We got a hideous cutter on the 11th-12th.

Nice fat band while Ray and central area were choking on exhaust:

Same with Feb 16th too....and even part two in the Feb 12-13 storm. It ended up like 200 miles east of the Euro's 72 hour forecast....there was a chance we'd have an all-out blizzard that morning of Monday Feb 13th. Instead we got just a bit of backlash snows in E MA that didn't amount to much except for maybe 3-5" on Cape Ann and also parts of Cape Cod.

The quick hitter (Feb 9th) storm kind of blew up on the models too around 48 hours out...it was poorly predicted in the medium range. We've had storms like that now for 3 winters in a row (Feb 5th, 2016 the winter before blew up inside of 48h and of course the Jan 2015 blizzard). March 14th kept trending NW every single run inside of 48 hours....but despite that, it was still a great storm even if we didn't jackpot. Prob a little more disappointing right near BOS where they underperformed relative to some of the western suburbs. That bulletproof pack though took forever to melt...well into April.

I posted some links further up: https://www.americanwx.com/bb/topic/48618-arctic-sea-ice-extent-area-and-volume/?do=findComment&comment=4619754 You can also check the arctic sea ice forum...there's a thread that lists the area and extent: https://forum.arctic-sea-ice.net/index.php?board=3.0 You might have been looking at the NSIDC interactive graph which actually plots a 2 day mean I think and not single daily values. The daily value is actually up to 4.65, but the daily min a few days ago was 4.61.

Ha...that one was so bad. I think I had about 4 inches of rain at 34F after a quick coating of snow. That airmass rotted horribly after the big block formed. We recycled that airmass I think for about 5-6 weeks straight.

Looks like area bottomed out at 2.94...so it managed to squeak below the 9/1 minimum of 2.99....the 2.94 ranks behind 2016, 2012, 2007, and 2011. So 5th lowest. We have since rebounded back up to 3.15 so we almost certainly reached the min...very tough to go back down over 200k from here. NSIDC extent will finish 8th lowest if it cannot decline another 60k...so far the minimum is 4.61 which is a measly 20k above the 2010 minimum. We could still decline though in extent on NSIDC enough to catch 2010...but it will need to happen within the next few days. Jaxa is still hovering not too far above the 9/9 minimum too...so it's possible we still go below that 4.47 number as well. PIOMAS hasn't updated their volume yet, but they usually do so a little after mid-September when they think the minimum has occurred...so we'll probably see an update from them in the next few days I'd think. Sometimes though, we don't get the update until early October...hopefully they decide to do the mid-month update.

The January 24th storm where we had that weird upslope in ORH county that allowed enough cooling for a lot of slee/tsnow mix while many others got sleet/ZR/RA The December 29th, 2016 paste job:

Bumping this thread...while responding to new Vermonter das in the 2016-2017 winter thread, I went into my attachments to find an old snowfall map...I came across a bunch of images from last winter. All in all, last winter really was pretty decent for most. Def a bit more frustrating right on the coast, but even there it was still above average for snowfall. Some of my favorite images I saw were: The approach of the huge March 14th nor' easter. We had over 14 inches in ORH...this storm happened too right around when we closed on our new house. We had around 11-12 inches in Holliston judging by the landscape the next day driving there. This one hit all of New England hard save maybe parts of the south coast which flipped pretty early and some extreme exposed spots on the eastern MA shore...Logan underperformed a bit. We actually managed to avoid flipping to sleet in ORH despite most models thinking we would...the snow did get a bit rimed though late in the storm when we finally dryslotted: Here's the big thump on Sunday Feb 12th that gave us about 9 inches...that had followed the really nice snowstorm on February 9th...we achieved max depth after the 12th storm: Awesome banding in the February 9th storm:

Sea ice extent on Jaxa is currently 4.48 million sq km. That ranks 6th lowest...you can find the data here and click on "extent graph" at the top: https://ads.nipr.ac.jp/vishop/#/monitor NSIDC area is currently at 4.63 million sq km. That currently ranks 7th lowest. You can find the data here (need excel) ftp://sidads.colorado.edu/DATASETS/NOAA/G02135/seaice_analysis/ or you can use their interactive graph: https://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/charctic-interactive-sea-ice-graph/

We may be on "minimum area watch" right now...On September 1st, the NSIDC (what CT SIA used when they were functioning) dropped to 2.99 million sq km. It then rebounded significantly before declining again, though the declines have been weak and we remain 130k above the minimum at 3.12 million sq km. If September 1st was indeed the minimum area, it would be the earliest area min since 2005 when the minimum occurred on August 31st. August 31st is also tied for the earliest area minimum with 1987. If 2.99 million sq km ends up being the minimum area, this would be 5th lowest. Only 2012, 2016, 2011, and 2007 were lower...it is nearly tied with 2008 which finished at an even 3.00 million sq km. It is still possible that area makes one more push and we achieve a new low...if it drops below 2.90 million sq km, then it could surpass 2007 and 2011. But time is rapidly running out and the weather does not look conductive to a big 2nd week September area decrease. Any push would have to come from the Atlantic side most likely (and very soon in the next couple days) since there's still some southerly wind there from a Kara low...but the Pacific side may see ice growth over the next week as a very cold low moves over the CAA and adjacent CAB. In a reversal of position from mid-August, extent is currently only 6th lowest or 7th lowest depending on the source you use (jaxa vs NSIDC). Recall that extent had been running more like 3rd lowest a few weeks ago....but the higher area ranking back then suggested that the extent was unlikely to compact like last year and 2015 did late in the season, so we fell behind the pace of those years. Extent is currently at its season minimum...it is not clear when the min will occur...it might be in about 2-3 days if that cold low materializes in the CAA/CAB which will help promote ice growth in the Beaufort/adjacent areas on very cold north and east winds.

PIOMAS updated for the end of August... Looks like we've inched above 2016 for 4th lowest now...2011 was also lower and 2012 has gone well into the depths. Close race with 2010 too for the min volume, though I think we'll finish a little lower than 2010 but stay higher than 2016.

One is using SSMI/S satellite, the other is using AMSR2. The SSMI/S (which is what NSIDC uses) tends to be a bit more volatile on a day to day basis...the two data sources will generally track the same direction over a period of weeks, but within a small timespan such as a few days, you might see some differences.

Enchanted Rock in Fredericksburg, TX about an hour west of Austin would be my top spot for 2024. Went camping and hiking there many times as a very young kid.

Both 2015 and 2016 had extreme losses in extent the final week of August, so I'd expect 2017 to separate from them more by 9/1 on NSIDC. Jaxa is a little less obvious as 2015 didn't have as steep a drop late as NSIDC had. The U Bremen AMSR2 is probably a little more like NSIDC:

There is zero chance we stay above 5 million sq km on jaxa...we are already down to 5,047,907 on jaxa. The lowest loss in recent years I could find between now and the min was 2014 when we lost only 500k of extent. If you go back to 2006, then that year lost only 300k from here to the min. Most years seem to lose between 600-800k of extent from here on out which would put us in the 4.2-4.4 range. A couple years lost around 900k...so we could end up as low as 4.1 or as high as 4.7 if we use the extremes as end points. We prob won't lose the higher amounts given how compact the ice pack is, but we will still easily be in the mid 4s on jaxa without a problem IMHO. NSIDC is a different story as it tends to run about 200k higher...jaxa had that revision in their method about 3 years ago which made it less compatible with NSIDC.

The definition of extent is anywhere within a grid cell that is >15% ice coverage/concentration. So if a 10km by 10km grid cell had 50% ice concentration, then it is classified as 100km² of ice extent. However, area calculates this as 50km² of ice coverage because it takes concentration into account. The reason we even had extent in the first place is because we didn't have satellites that could view the ice in very high resolution...the grid cells were typically 25km by 25km....because ice moves a lot and the satellites also pick up some false ice or false water (when melt ponding occurs), the extent method was deemed more consistent and a conservative measurement of the ice. As we get higher and higher resolution of satellites, we will probably eventually get to the point where area is equal to extent. But for historical comparison, NASA still uses the 25km grid size method...using a smaller one like from AMSR2 (as low as 3km) and comparing it to 25km cells wouldn't be an apples to apples comparison. JAXA has tried to adjust for these differences in their own historical data.

There hasn't been any trend in minimum date since records began...but it's possible we start seeing it trend earlier if we get more years with open water close to the pole. But years like 2007 and 2012 had pretty late minimums...so the open waters those years did not facilitate early mins. It is still almost entirely weather dependent.

We would need perfect weather I think to get a minimum in August for extent...I don't think it's ever happened in the jaxa record. Earliest I could find was 9/1 in 1997...looks like 1988 was 9/2. It admittedly might be a little easier to get a min in August with less ice extent than previous years if there's some open water pretty close to the pole...as that will tend to freeze much earlier than the peripheral areas. We sort of saw this last year when we had a min on 9/7...pretty early. Area has twice had minimums in August...2005 and 1986 I believe. Both were on August 31st I believe.

We had a really compact ice pack with very few regions of very low concentration so it is not a huge surprise that we've seen a stall in extent while area has resumed its drop (after stalling earlier). The weather was never that great for losing a lot of extent this past week...we did get that cyclone earlier, but it never got nearly as intense as the 2012 cyclone and it occurred over a pack that was not nearly as shredded as 2012.