{"id":3906,"date":"2026-06-18T15:04:47","date_gmt":"2026-06-18T13:04:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/arcticwatch.info\/index.php\/2026\/06\/18\/the-northwest-passage-in-2026\/"},"modified":"2026-06-18T15:04:47","modified_gmt":"2026-06-18T13:04:47","slug":"the-northwest-passage-in-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/arcticwatch.info\/index.php\/2026\/06\/18\/the-northwest-passage-in-2026\/","title":{"rendered":"The Northwest Passage in 2026"},"content":{"rendered":"
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For those of you unfamiliar with the names of the assorted islands and channels of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago here is a map that hopefully helps:<\/p>\n

\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

Plus another map detailing the routes through the Canadian Arctic Archipelago that have previously been successfully navigated by vessels large and small:<\/p>\n

\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

The sea ice in Lancaster Sound and the Amundsen Gulf is breaking up, and melt ponds are now visible on the fast ice across much of the southern route through the Canadian Arctic Archipelago: <\/p>\n

\n
\"\"<\/a>
\u201cFalse colour\u201d image of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago on\u00a0<\/em>June 17th<\/a>\u00a0from the MODIS instrument on the Terra satellite<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

The melt ponds previously visible in the Coronation Gulf now appear to have drained:<\/p>\n

\n
\"\"<\/a>
\u201cFalse colour\u201d image of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago on\u00a0<\/em>June 3rd<\/a>\u00a0from the MODIS instrument on the Aqua satellite<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

To get a better feel for what might happen during the coming summer season here\u2019s the state of play in the third dimension, courtesy of the Alfred Wegener Institute\u2019s last combined thickness data of the winter from the Cryosat-2, Sentinel 3 and SMOS satellites:<\/p>\n

\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

Let\u2019s also take a look at the\u00a0Canadian Ice Service<\/a>\u2018s sea ice \u201cstage of development\u201d charts. Here\u2019s the most recent one for the \u201cWestern Arctic\u201d, from June 15th:<\/p>\n

\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

There is no old ice anywhere on the southern route, so the stage seems set for the Northwest Passage to open relatively early this summer, with a final \u201cchoke point\u201d in the Larsen Sound\/Franklin Strait region.<\/p>\n

Note that a potential fly in the NWP ointment being a recurrence of last year\u2019s winds<\/a> that blew old ice in the Beaufort Sea close to shore!<\/p>\n

Watch this space!<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For those of you unfamiliar with the names of the assorted islands and channels of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago here is a map that hopefully helps: Plus another map detailing the routes through the Canadian Arctic Archipelago that have previously…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3907,"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":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3906","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/arcticwatch.info\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3906","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=3906"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/arcticwatch.info\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3906\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arcticwatch.info\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3907"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/arcticwatch.info\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3906"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arcticwatch.info\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3906"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arcticwatch.info\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3906"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}