While U.S. in Big Chill, Arctic Runs Fever

While parts of North America have been in the icy grips of an unusually cold and snowy winter recently, the Arctic has been downright balmy compared to past winters.

These warmer-than-normal temperatures mean that the sea ice in the Arctic is looking pretty anemic, despite the winter season.

Arctic ice goes through a normal cycle of summer thaw and winter re-freeze. In recent decades, however, sea ice has become overall less extensive and thinner, leading to forecasts that in future decades the polar region will be ice-free during summer. The trend looks to be continuing this winter, scientists now say.

“It’s warm everywhere in the Arctic. It’s anomalously warm,” said Julienne Stroeve, of the National Snow & Ice Data Center (NSIDC) in Boulder, Colo.

Both December and January have been abnormally warm months, which impacts the cyclical re-freezing of sea ice over the years, because these are “two crucial ice-growing months,” Stroeve told LiveScience.

Live Science