bluewave

2019 continues to remain in the top 3 lowest extents right into early July. 7-2 2019....9.056 2012....8.971 2010....8.943

The record Chukchi SST warming has implications for the entire Arctic. https://www.newscientist.com/article/2178160-a-warm-water-time-bomb-could-spell-disaster-for-arctic-sea-ice/ The Arctic is in hot water, literally, following the discovery that heat has been accumulating rapidly in a salty layer of the Arctic Ocean 50 metres down. Currently, it’s being held at that depth by a less dense layer of freshwater overhead, but if the two layers start to mix it could melt all seasonal sea ice, accelerating the already-rapid loss of polar ice cover. Researchers discovered the heat time-bomb after analysing publicly available data on ice cover, and at different depths on sea temperature, heat content and saltiness over the past three decades. The data was gathered around the Canadian Basin, a major basin of the Arctic Ocean fed by waters from the North Chukchi Sea, just north of the Bering Strait between Alaska and Siberia. Over this timespan, the heat content of the salty layer doubled, from 200 to 400 million joules per square metre, enough to reduce overall Arctic ice thickness by 80 centimetres. The root cause is global warming, which has seen temperatures in the Arctic rise by 2 degrees from pre-industrial levels–twice the global average—leading to record-low sea ice coverage. The researchers found that with sea ice retreating, heat absorption by exposed surface waters has increased fivefold in 30 years, mainly from direct sunlight, which no longer gets reflected by ice. And with no ice in the way, strong northerly winds push these newly-warmed surface waters at the Arctic fringes down to the depths where they’re now accumulating under the Arctic. The fear is that the freshwater “lid” keeping them there could fall apart. “It could be lost through increased mechanical mixing of the water layers, especially driven by the winds,” says Mary-Louise Timmermans at Yale University and head of the team. “With continued sea-ice losses, we’d have more wind-driven mixing, and that would erode this natural barrier,” she says. Loss of a protective “freshwater” layer is already happening elsewhere around the Arctic in the Barents Sea north of Scandinavia, allowing warmer Atlantic waters to flow in and potentially destroy an entire Arctic ecosystem in the North Barents Sea within a decade.

Looks like June finished with the 2nd lowest extent on record behind 2016. https://mobile.twitter.com/ZLabe/status/1145720975402553344 Average June #Arctic sea ice extent was the 2nd lowest on record. It was 1,230,000 km² below the 1981-2010 average. https://mobile.twitter.com/AlaskaWx/status/1145790324465254400 Chukchi Sea average ice extent in June was the lowest of record in 41 years of daily passive microwave data from NSIDC. That means an additional (compared to normal) area the size of Florida was open water being heated by the sun instead of ice.

I think Europe will finally adopt air conditioning now. https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2019/06/28/europes-record-heatwave-is-changing-stubborn-minds-about-value-air-conditioning/?utm_term=.ea277d2c3a0d Until now, fewer than 5 percent of all European households have been air-conditioned, compared with 90 percent in the United States. But Europe’s air-conditioner stock is estimated to roughly double within the next two decades, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA), as record heat becomes more frequent and prolonged because of climate change. On a continent that has long shrugged off air conditioning as unnecessary and where doctors still debate its potentially harmful side effects, this week’s quest to find cooler air may foreshadow a drastic change in Europeans’ relationship to the air conditioner. Dirk Trembich, the head of the Berliner Klima air-conditioning company, said interest began to surge in April 2018 — ahead of a record-hot summer. Demand still hasn’t faded.

The sea ice north of Greenland is projected to be the last to go. https://ccin.ca/ccw/seaice/future

Very impressive dipole pattern continues on the models into early July. Extent has pulled slightly ahead of 2012. Overall 2nd place for the date behind 2010. 2010.....9.501 2019.....9.660 2016.....9.665 2012.....9.678

You can see why the Arctic Basin is at record low levels of extent. Blocking and record warmth focused over the Pacific sector. This is the opposite of 2012 when the harshest conditions were centered closer to the Atlantic regions. While 2019 has an Arctic Basin lead over 2012, the 2012 Atlantic extent was low enough to maintain a small overall advantage. NSIDC extent 6-26-19....9.819 6-26-12....9.712

June 1973? https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/stormevents/eventdetails.jsp?id=10073922

They were both the strongest of their class for the South Shore of Nassau. An intense line of severe thunderstorms oriented from north to south developed during Labor Day afternoon ahead of a strong approaching cold front. As the storms moved east at 40 to 50 mph, they produced high winds, large hail, and an isolated tornado. Wind gusts from 60 to 80 mph downed many trees and power lines throughout the area. The cost estimates of damage included above are preliminary figures submitted by the Nassau County Office of Emergency Management. In Richmond County, the following peak wind gusts were reported: 80 mph at Great Kills, the Verranzano Bridge, and in Richmond. High winds downed trees and caused a building to collapse in Richmond. One tree fell on and injured a man in Richmond. In New York County (Manhattan), high winds caused a building to collapse. In the Bronx, high winds downed a tree that fell on 3 people resulting in 1 death and 2 injuries in the courtyard of the Edenwald Houses at 1135 East 229th Street. In Kings County (Brooklyn), high winds downed and uprooted several large trees. One tree fell on and injured a person at East 229th Street. Five to 6-foot diameter trees were uprooted east of Coney Island in the Gerritsen Beach Section, where 3 funnel clouds were also sighted and a firefighter was injured from large hail. Large trees also fell on and damaged cars in Bensonhurst. In Queens County, a peak wind gust of 62 mph was measured at both LaGuardia Airport and at JFK Airport. In Nassau County, the following peak wind gusts were reported: 75 mph in Farmingdale, 60 mph in Port Washington and Mineola and 58 mph at Farmingdale Republic Airport. High winds downed large tree limbs at Rockville Center, Baldwin, and Oceanside and downed trees in Long Beach, Massapequa, and Valley Stream. One-inch diameter hail dented cars and covered the ground in Farmingdale. In Suffolk County, high winds overturned many boats in the Great South Bay, downed large trees in West Babylon and Rocky Point and downed large tree limbs in Wading River. One person died when a thunderstorm wind gust capsized a 19 foot sail boat in Great South Bay near Copiague. A Centerport woman, 36, and her daughter, 3, were injured when a tree fell on them in the parking lot of the Ground Round Restaurant and CVS on Fort Salonga Road. The following peak wind gusts were reported: 72 mph in Babylon and 65 mph in Fire Island. The NWS confirmed that an F2 tornado was responsible for significant damage that occurred in Lynbrook. Most of the village received damage from straight line winds up to 80 mph, that was associated with a severe squall line. Downed trees covered the village with some structural damage where the F2 tornado touched down. The major path of damage was from the northwest section of Lynbrook east-southeast to the southeast section of the village. Funnel clouds were observed from near the intersection of Marshall Ave. and Burtis Street and to the southeast. A tornado was first sighted by two eyewitnesses on Hampton Place. It rose and touched down several times: Second, near Winter Street and across Glover Circle; Third, along Peninsula Blvd. between Earle and Benton Avenues; and Fourth, as a weak F2 near the intersection of Rocklyn Ave. and Merrick Road. It moved across the Long Island Railroad Tracks and Sunrise Highway before it finally dissipated. More than three hundred trees were blown over, many on houses and cars. Six people received minor injuries. Four of these were in "The Fun Zone" on Rocklyn Avenue. One woman was slightly injured by a tree that fell on her car. One police officer was also injured.

The big story this year is the record warmth and low sea ice extent in the Pacific sector. But you can see 2012 ahead of 2019 in the Atlantic sector. Overall, 2019 is a bit behind the pace of 2012 to date. https://mobile.twitter.com/AlaskaWx/status/1143202863633448960 The northern Bering & southern Chukchi Seas are baking. Large areas away from land with ocean surface temperatures more than 5C (9F) above the 1981-2010 average. Impacts to the climate system, food web, communities and commerce https://mobile.twitter.com/AlaskaWx/status/1142829854930296832 Chukchi and Beaufort Seas combined #seaice extent remains the lowest of record ( @NSIDC passive microwave data since 1979), 21 percent below the 1981-2010 median. Lower concentration of ice will be easily moved by winds this week.

This reminds me of how hard it was for people to get off the water in time during the Labor Day Derecho In 98. https://mobile.twitter.com/EngelWX/status/1141870506242662400

The AMO has become more amplified as the climate warmed. So even natural variability is impacted by climate change. https://www.nature.com/articles/srep40861 Amplification of the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation associated with the onset of the industrial-era warming North Atlantic sea surface temperatures experience variability with a periodicity of 60–80 years that is known as the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO). It has a profound imprint on the global climate system that results in a number of high value societal impacts. However the industrial period, i.e. the middle of the 19th century onwards, contains only two full cycles of the AMO making it difficult to fully characterize this oscillation and its impact on the climate system. As a result, there is a clear need to identify paleoclimate records extending into the pre-industrial period that contain an expression of the AMO. This is especially true for extratropical marine paleoclimate proxies where such expressions are currently unavailable. Here we present an annually resolved coralline algal time series from the northwest Atlantic Ocean that exhibits multidecadal variability extending back six centuries. The time series contains a statistically significant trend towards higher values, i.e. warmer conditions, beginning in the 19th century that coincided with an increase in the time series’ multidecadal power. We argue that these changes are associated with a regional climate reorganization involving an amplification of the AMO that coincided with onset of the industrial-era warming.

This is the lowest that CPOM has gone since they began issuing outlooks back around 2014. While their forecasts usually finish within the error bars, they are often a little too high. CPOM June forecast compared September average NSIDC extent verification Standard Deviations +/- 0.5 mill. km2 2018...F...5.30....V...4.71 2017...F...5.00.....V..4.80 2016...F...4.50......V..4.70 2015...F...5.10......V..4.63 2014..F....5.40.......V..5.30

The Pacific sector continues to experience the most hostile conditions for the sea ice. https://mobile.twitter.com/alaskawx?lang=en BREAKING CLIMATE: Utqiaġvik (Barrow) has been up to 73F (22.8C) through 7pm AKDT Thursday. This is a new all-time record high for the month of June. Previous record 72F (22.2C) on June 18, 1996. Climate obs since 1920

TWC back on FIOS TV channel 611 beginning June 24th. https://mobile.twitter.com/weatherchannel/status/1141329701178368000

This is the first time since 2012 that we had such a hostile pattern from 05-15 to 6-14.

The Pacific side has gotten off to an especially rough start this year. https://mobile.twitter.com/AlaskaWx/status/1140230023636541440 Sea ice extent in the Chukchi & Beaufort Seas near Alaska at record low level for mid-June. A storm this past week pushed broken #seaice back over previously open water in the Beaufort Sea, resulting in a slight increase in extent.

This was the 2nd warmest on record in Greenland for June behind 2012. https://earther.gizmodo.com/half-of-greenlands-surface-started-melting-this-week-w-1835483363 Ruth Mottram, a climate scientist with the Danish Meteorological Institute, told Earther that the weather station at the top of the ice sheet saw temperatures reach above freezing on Wednesday and they were headed that way again on Thursday. That puts them just a degree or so away from setting the all-time heat record for June, which is currently held by June 2012. The spike in temperatures has caused a spike in melt. Roughly 45 percent of the ice sheet surface has been melting. Normally, less than 10 percent of the ice sheet surface is melting at this time of year. According to data from the National Snow and Ice Data Center, Wednesday set a daily record for the widest melt area on that date, with 275,000 square miles—an area bigger than Texas—of the ice sheet’s surface becoming a slushy, watery mess. Mottram said the much of the ice is likely to refreeze once the heat breaks, but it will be more primed to melt later in the season. https://mobile.twitter.com/RasmusTonboe/status/1139504201615237120 got the difficult task of retrieving our oceanographic moorings and weather station on sea ice in North West Greenland this year. Rapid melt and sea ice with low permeability and few cracks leaves the melt water on top.

Extent just fell below 2016 for a new record on this date. https://mobile.twitter.com/Climatologist49/status/1138471666630053888 As of June 10th, Arctic sea ice is now the lowest on record during the satellite era (1979-2019). The extent is typical for Jun 28th. As the basin scale, the Beaufort Sea ice is the big loser. It is already at a mid-August state! https://mobile.twitter.com/AlaskaWx/status/1137749983787012096 Unprecedented early #seaice loss from both Chukchi & Beaufort Seas north and west of Alaska. June 8th extent from is 1981-2010 median for Aug 01! Five lowest extents for this date are 2015 through 2019.

Looks like the earliest in the season that north of 80N went above freezing. http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/meant80n.uk.php

It’s not only near the ocean. Elevating the homes in the expanding flood zones will be a very expensive proposition. https://www.citylab.com/environment/2018/03/new-report-says-fema-badly-underestimates-flood-risk/554627/

These are pretty cool.

The army corps is working on a plan for the back bays. But flood gates have plenty of environmental concerns. Such a flood control system would be big bucks. https://www.riverkeeper.org/blogs/ecology/storm-surge-barriers-for-ny-harbor-threaten-life-of-the-hudson-river/ https://www.nap.usace.army.mil/Missions/Civil-Works/Nassau-County-Back-Bays-Study/ https://patch.com/new-york/longbeach/army-corps-holding-public-meetings-back-bays-study The Army Corps released a status report on April 30 which includes information on work completed to date, potential alternatives under consideration and details on next steps. Some of the measures that will be discussed at the public meetings include structural solutions such as storm surge barriers, tide gates, levees and floodwalls; non-structural solutions such as elevating homes; and natural features such as marsh restoration and the creation of living shorelines. The final plan may also include recommendations of policy items such as floodplain management and Community Rating System enhancement opportunities.

Warmest May on record for the Arctic. https://sites.uci.edu/zlabe/arctic-temperatures/

I am really happy how Long Beach found a way to bounce back after Sandy. The whole oceanfront has changed pretty dramatically with the major beach reconstruction. I couldn’t believe how different things looked when I visited recently. Plenty of new restaurants and boardwalk concessions recently opened up. Seems like a big influx of new residents from NYC after Sandy. I guess all the new FEMA compliant construction was an opening for newcomers to move there.