Antarctica’s Shrinking Sea Ice Hits a Record Low, Alarming Scientists
It could be the start of “a long-term trend of decline” in the ice due to climate change, according to the National Snow and Ice Data Center in the US.
In the Antarctic, sea ice typically covers the largest expanse of ocean at some point in September. After that, it begins a slow melt over the southern hemisphere’s summer.
Photographer: Torsten Blackwood/Pool/Getty Images
At its largest expanse this year, sea ice covered less than 17 million square kilometers (6.6 million square miles) of the Antarctic — an area that is 1 million square kilometers (almost 400,000 square miles) smaller than the previous record low set in 1986, according to preliminary figures released Monday by the National Snow and Ice Data Center at the University of Colorado Boulder. The number represents the smallest peak extent in almost 45 years of satellite records.
Peak Antarctic ice coverage during the region’s winter — which is the northern hemisphere’s summer — likely occurred on Sept. 10. On that date sea ice stretched over 16.96 million square kilometers, after which it began to shrink, the NSIDC said. This took place almost two weeks earlier than the median date of September 23 between 1981 and 2010.