{"id":1535,"date":"2024-03-25T17:00:52","date_gmt":"2024-03-25T17:00:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/arcticwatch.info\/index.php\/2024\/03\/25\/arctic-sea-ice-reaches-a-below-average-maximum\/"},"modified":"2024-04-14T22:41:08","modified_gmt":"2024-04-14T22:41:08","slug":"arctic-sea-ice-reaches-a-below-average-maximum","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/arcticwatch.info\/index.php\/2024\/03\/25\/arctic-sea-ice-reaches-a-below-average-maximum\/","title":{"rendered":"Arctic sea ice suddenly reaches a below-average maximum"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Arctic sea ice has likely reached its maximum extent for the year, at 15.01 million square kilometers (5.80 million square miles) on March 14. The 2024 maximum is the fourteenth lowest in the 46-year satellite record.<\/p>\n

Overview of conditions<\/h2>\n
\"Map<\/a><\/p>\n

Figure 1. Arctic sea ice extent for March 14, 2024, was\u00a015.01 million square kilometers (5.80 million square miles). The orange line shows the 1981 to 2010 average extent for that day. Sea Ice Index<\/a> data. About the data<\/a><\/p>\n

Credit: National Snow and Ice Data Center
\nHigh-resolution image<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

On March 14, 2024, Arctic sea ice likely reached its maximum extent for the year, at\u00a015.01 million square kilometers (5.80 million square miles), the fourteenth lowest extent in the satellite record. This year\u2019s maximum extent is 640,000 square kilometers (247,000 square miles) below the 1981 to 2010 average maximum of 15.65 million square kilometers (6.04 million square miles) and 600,000 square kilometers (232,000 square miles) above the lowest maximum of 14.41 million square kilometers (5.56 million square miles) set on March 7, 2017.<\/p>\n

The date of the maximum this year, March 14, was\u00a0two days\u00a0later than the 1981 to 2010\u00a0average date of March 12.<\/p>\n

Conditions in context<\/h2>\n
\"graph<\/a><\/p>\n

Figure 2. The graph above shows Arctic sea ice extent as of March 14, 2024, along with daily ice extent data for four previous years and the record low year. 2023 to 2024 is shown in blue, 2022 to 2023 in green, 2021 to 2022 in orange, 2020 to 2021 in brown, 2019 to 2020 in magenta, and 2011 to 2012 in dashed brown. The 1981 to 2010 median is in dark gray. The gray areas around the median line show the interquartile and interdecile ranges of the data. Sea Ice Index<\/a> data.<\/p>\n

Credit: National Snow and Ice Data Center
\nHigh-resolution image<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

The ice growth season ended with near average sea ice extent in Baffin Bay, average extent in the Bering Sea,\u00a0above average in\u00a0the northern portion of the Sea of Okhotsk and Greenland Sea,\u00a0and below average in the Barents Sea.\u00a0Extent was well below average in the Gulf of St. Lawrence and the southern portion of the Sea of Okhotsk.<\/p>\n

Since the maximum on March 14, extent has dropped about 160,000 square kilometers (62,000 square miles), with losses in the northern portion of the Sea of Okhotsk and the Bering Sea. These losses have been offset by gains in the\u00a0Barents Sea and Gulf of St. Lawrence.<\/p>\n

\n

The downward linear trend in Arctic sea ice maximum extent from1979 to 2024 is 39,800 square kilometers (15,400 square miles) per year, or 2.5 percent per decade relative to the 1981 to 2010 average.\u00a0Based on the linear trend values, the maximum extent has declined 1.79 million square kilometers (691,000 square miles) since 1979. This is equivalent to the size of Alaska or\u00a0five times the size of Germany.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Table 1. Ten lowest maximum Arctic sea ice extents\u00a0(satellite record, 1979 to present)<\/h2>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
Rank<\/strong><\/td>\nYear<\/strong><\/td>\nIn millions of square kilometers<\/strong><\/td>\nIn millions of square miles<\/strong><\/td>\nDate<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
1<\/td>\n2017<\/td>\n14.41<\/td>\n5.56<\/td>\nMarch 7<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
2<\/td>\n2018<\/td>\n14.47<\/td>\n5.59<\/td>\nMarch 17<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
3<\/td>\n2016
\n2015<\/td>\n		14.51
\n14.52<\/td>\n		5.60
\n5.61<\/td>\n		March 23
\nFebruary 25<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
5<\/td>\n2023<\/td>\n14.62<\/td>\n5.64<\/td>\nMarch 6<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
6<\/td>\n2011
\n2006<\/td>\n		14.67
\n14.68<\/td>\n		5.66
\n5.67<\/td>\n		March 9
\nMarch 12<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
8<\/td>\n2007
\n2021<\/td>\n		14.77
\n14.78<\/td>\n		5.70
\n5.71<\/td>\n		March 12
\nMarch 12<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
10<\/td>\n2019<\/td>\n14.82<\/td>\n5.72<\/td>\nMarch 13<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

For the Arctic maximum, which typically occurs in March, the uncertainty range is ~34,000\u00a0square kilometers (13,000 square miles), meaning that extents within this range must be considered effectively equal.<\/p>\n

<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Arctic sea ice has likely reached its maximum extent for the year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1536,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":[],"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","_themeisle_gutenberg_block_has_review":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1535","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-analysis"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/arcticwatch.info\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1535","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/arcticwatch.info\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/arcticwatch.info\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arcticwatch.info\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arcticwatch.info\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1535"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/arcticwatch.info\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1535\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1636,"href":"https:\/\/arcticwatch.info\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1535\/revisions\/1636"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arcticwatch.info\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1536"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/arcticwatch.info\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1535"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arcticwatch.info\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1535"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arcticwatch.info\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1535"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}