Arctic sea ice at lowest recorded level ever

Science Daily: Arctic sea ice may well have reached its lowest volumes ever, as summer ice coverage of the Arctic Sea looks set to be close to last year’s record lows, with thinner ice overall. Final figures on minimum ice coverage for 2008 are expected in a matter of days, but they are already flirting with last year’s record low of 1.59 million square miles, or 4.13 million square kilometres.

“If you take reduced ice thickness into account, there is probably less ice overall in the Arctic this year than in any other year since monitoring began,” said Martin Sommerkorn, WWF International Arctic Programme’s Senior Climate Change Advisor. “This is also the first year that the Northwest Passage over the top of North America, and the Northeast Passage over the top of Russia are both free of ice.”

Dr. Sommerkorn said the continuing loss of older, thicker ice means that the Arctic ice cover is following a trend of becoming younger and thinner each year….

…“We are expecting confirmation of 2008 being either the lowest or the second-lowest year in terms of summer ice coverage,” Dr. Sommerkorn said. “This means two years in a row of record lows since we started recording Arctic sea ice coverage, and a continuing catastrophic downward trend….

Barents' ship among the Arctic ice, from "The account of Barents's Three Voyages, Gerard De Veer