The Earth has missed a lot of sea ice this year. It's enough to cover the entire US in eastern Mississippi.
This was announced Thursday by NASA researchers and the National Snow and Ice Data Center.
The record comes days after the world weather organization reported that the past decade was the hottest year on record and 2024 was the hottest year. The global rise in temperature is linked to increased concentrations of greenhouse gases, primarily caused by the burning of fossil fuels.
“Temperatures melt around the world and melt ice. With such high temperatures, it's not surprising that there's less ice cover this year.
The center has compiled data for almost 50 years, primarily through the Department of Defense satellite programs. The global sea ice range includes measurements taken in both the Southern and Northern Hemispheres, experiencing opposite seasons.
Dr. Boysbert compared the freezing and thawing of sea ice during winter and summer with the heartbeat of the planet. The pulses between the winter maximum and summer minimum were previously shorter. However, as more sea ice melted, the distance between the pulses increased.
“It's like the planet's heartbeat is slowing down,” Dr. Boyceberts said. “That's not good.”
Sea ice plays many important roles for the global climate. Its white surface reflects energy into the universe and helps the planet cool. It also functions like a sea blanket, insulates it, and keeps the ocean heat from reaching the atmosphere. Less sea ice means increased heat in the Earth's system, warming the atmosphere and oceans.
It's not just the only measurements that scientists are tracking. The thickness of the ice is also important, and Arctic sea ice has been thinner since the 1980s.
Thick sea ice tends to withstand the melting of summer, but today most sea ice is completely melted during the summer, making sure it doesn't thicken every year. More open ocean means more darker surfaces to absorb more heat from the sun, which means melting more ice. Melting becomes its own positive feedback loop.
Changes in remote polar regions affect other parts of the globe, such as changes in ocean currents and weather patterns.
“It's really important to aim for scientists to data,” Dr. Boysbert said. “It's really harmful not to fund this type of work.”
Melted sea ice also has negative implications for marine life, polar tourism, and global transport. It is important for military operations, Alaska's Indigenous communities and fisheries, according to Walt Meyer, a senior research scientist at the National Snow and Ice Data Center, a research institute at the University of Colorado in Boulder. The trend to reduce sea ice in the Arctic is an increasingly clear indicator of global warming, he said.
“We have seen something quite unprecedented for at least thousands of years.
Under the Trump administration, scientific institutions monitoring weather and climate data are under threat. In March, NASA fired the Chief Scientist and eliminated more than 12 other senior positions. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which collects global climate data, fired hundreds of probation employees in February, and officials said they plan to reduce the workforce by nearly 20%. The project focused on lost managers in polar regions who oversee the research when the National Science Foundation fired about a tenth of the workforce.
When asked about the cut, Dr. Meyer noted that European and Japanese groups are also monitoring sea ice around the world.
“No matter what happens in the US, it's not that we don't have knowledge of what's going on in the Arctic,” he said.
“But I think that all of us here at NSIDC are focused on data and our research and are doing our best to the public by letting people know what's going on in the polar regions.”
