Gray-Wolf

I've now realised that what has happened is that , post 07' ,I was keeping an eye out for the return of such extreme forcings ( as we saw in 2007?) to cause us to see another record low 'step down' in ice extent/area/volume, but in reality the pack was becoming conditioned to see '07' scale losses in an 'average summer'? But this year is not setting up to be 'an average summer' is it? With us still seeing a 'perfect melt storm-esque' synoptic hammering the ice we appear to be building melt momentum for at least record low sea ice territory if not worse? Forecasts show lots of heat , from the land masses, flowing over sectors of the basin these coming 10 days and this is coupled with peak insolation for the rest of the pack sitting under HP domination? By months end , with Hudson & Baffin then in play, we will be seeing big daily losses and an ever more opened pack ( with plenty of 'dark water' to capture the suns energy) in time for 'peak melt' If ,by Aug, we see home grown cyclones in the basin then the 'bottom melt' phase of the season will be devastating considering the warmth in the waters the ice will be tossed around in as the lows pass over. We'll see what tRump & co. have to say if we do end on a disastrous low figure this year & see even more energy flood the Arctic atmosphere as the basin tries to prepare for re-freeze.

So the 'Perfect melt storm' synoptic rolls on with the high intensifying over the pole this coming 10 days. You need remember it takes 70 cals of energy to melt a 1cm cube of ice (due to the demands of the latent heat of fusion) but add another 70 cals to that water and it warms to 70c!!! Unlike 07' when we had the last 'Perfect Melt storm' there is already open water both around ,and inside, the pack this year so we will see warmed 'kill zones' for ice to float into later in the season ( unlike 07') Should those warmed waters help feed cyclones over Aug/Sept, tossing the ice around in those warmed waters, then we will be in serious trouble!!!

And still we continue on the 'perfect melt storm' trajectory! The latest outlooks place a big high right across the pole for the most intense dose of solar that the season has to offer!! Let's not forget that the pole gets its solar 24/7 this time of year so that is a lot of energy pilling onto the thin ice and a healthy export of our oldest ice through Fram. If we get through to July in similar shape I think it will be safe to call a challenge on 2012's assortment of records?

As we see in our temp record big Nino's lead to a temporary surge in Global temps. With us sailing so close to so many potential tipping points in our climate system we need worry each time we see a moderate ( or above?) Nino in the making..... Once that Djin is out of the bottle there's no putting it back in!!!

Indeed forkyfork! Not just the forcing toward Fram exit all the way from the Pacific entrance but the conditioning this will put on a pack that is mainly small floes 'glued together' by late formed ice? Such a dynamic fragmentation event will also lead to mechanical weathering of floes as they bump and barge one another on their travels? Then we have Barentsz and the open waters maintained over winter ( again) hinting at what awaits ice pushed into that region? 'Collapse and spread' of ice entering open water may see extent/area figures but this will be temporary and illusory. Something feels 'off' about this melt season? I do not know if it is the record summer the southern Hemisphere just had, and the fear of such conditions transfering North with the sun or the strange amounts of High Pressure across the hemisphere? The 'Greenland high' caused issues across Greenland in 2012 and now , after a few years of it not performing, we see it apparently back to strength? Then there is the 'Perfect melt storm synoptic'? If we are still able to see such develop, and we have not mangled the atmospheric too much for such to develop, then we are still in its return period......

Well we are certainly still on track for a 'perfect melt storm' summer......just without the 'perfect melt storm' synoptics??? Is this what the last 5 years of 'winter preconditioning' was all about? Taking us to the point where an 'average summer' feeds us a sub 2007 finish and , over time, the 'Blue Ocean' event?

Well I think we will look to 2018 as a precursor for 2019? The continued Chinese 'clean up' of their pollution continues to grow and now the Interdecadal Pacific Oscillation is positive ( since 2014) the extra heat reaching the ocean surface now stays at the surface instead of being buried in the ocean as it is under I.P.O. negative....... only another 25yrs of that to come and , I'd guess, a continuation of China cleaning up its act? So we begin to shed the heat accrued over the noughties in the Pacific whilst the incoming solar stays at the surface to interact with the atmosphere even as more and more solar gets through to the surface as 'dimming' reduces........ That's the Pacific Basin and its part in it all but what of the rest of the globe? How will Arctic Sea Ice fare this year? Already both ocean entrances are near ice free and so soaking up the incoming solar. With surface warmth ,under IPO positive, also flowing into the basin from the Bering side how low will our ice go? ( we are still in the return period for the 'Perfect Melt Storm' as well) Then we have Yamal. 3 years ago ( nearly) over 7,000 'pingo like structures' grew out of the permafrost. We ( I'm sure) have all seen images of the 'blowouts' of such structures back in 2015? Prof Semiletov ( Shakova and Semiletov?) tells us it is 3 years from formation to eruption so what happens this year across Yamal? If Shakova is correct and there is a huge reserve of 'free methane' capped below the permafrost ice then what if one , or more ,of these structures taps into that reserve? Yamal is a major natural gas producer and Russia has just committed to year round export from there........do they think they might lose their reserve if they do not act fast? With the Southern hemisphere posting such a hot summer are we to see a repeat in our hemisphere over the coming months?

I'd put the year as 2014? We saw the interdecadal Pacific Oscillation turn positive ( so augmenting warming) and China continued to push on with its 'clean air initiative' lessening dimming directly downwind so lifting the pall from over the Pacific. The 'faux pause' was part driven by that dimming ( allowing the IPO negative to go into overdrive burying heat in the upper ocean) so both reduced dimming and its flip positive gave a major shunt to global temp gains ( matching rates from the 80's/90's?) All of this played out in the confides of the impacts that low sea ice in the Arctic Basin placed on the polar Jet. Here in the UK we suffered 'washout summers' from 07' to around 2013 when they began to ease off ( just as my kids grew up enough not to need 'entertaining all summer hols long!!) Since 2016 we have increasingly seen High Pressure dominate our patterns. I place the initial drops in Arctic sea ice , culminating in 07', as setting the Polar Jet so as to 'trough' to our west and then the 2012 drops in the basin to tweaking that pattern to now have a ridge to our north ( bringing in the settled .warm ,dry summers). Again this year we see open water in the ocean entrances to the basin from the get go. So we are harvesting incoming solar from the get go guaranteeing another disturbed atmosphere this autumn/early winter as that heat is shed.

I think as folk were pondering the loss of those remnant ice caps they had no idea of both the temp impacts of ice free Arctic waters ( whilst ice free) and the rapid moistening of the Arctic Atmosphere with WAA driving winter temps above melt and , more importantly ,dropping increasing amounts of rain ( instead of snow) as the lows pass over? If the loss of snow cover/ice cover penetrates for up to 1,500km then nowhere in the basin will expect not to be impacted. On that note look how fast the N.Hemisphere snow cover is falling away from such a high max?

We are also seeing some massive temp anoms across areas of the basin so not only do we enter melt season lowest on record but with some pretty aggressive conditions on the ground?

I think we all now accept that we are as warm as we were 125,000 yrs ago and at that time Greenland was 2/3rds ice free and West Antarctica was ice free. I know we have a bit of 'catchup' to do due to lag in climate response but I think we need be mindful of GHG's 125,000yrs ago and what became of the carbon cycle that supported those levels? How much of that Carbon cycle is left in suspended animation beneath the ice cover of West Antarctica/Greenland? If our messing has placed over 120ppm of CO2 (from very ancient carbon cycles) back into the system ,and so have now driven temps/circulation changes to enable the global ice cover of 125,000 yrs ago surely we will pick up some of that buried carbon cycle as we go? If we do then we should expect fiercer warming and more of our 'hibernating carbon cycle' to become reanimated and around we go again..... I think the complete glaciation of Antarctica began as CO2 levels dropped below 600 ppm. Is that where we are headed and how much of that PETM carbon cycle is sat below Antarctica's ice cover awaiting its reanimation? To me Humanity has only managed to light the blue touch paper. Mother N. is the main charge that we ought be planning to avoid/deal with?