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Winnipeg Free Press - PRINT EDITION

Sea ice third-lowest on record

By: Bob Weber

Posted: 09/16/2010 1:00 AM | Comments: 0 (including replies)

JONATHAN HAYWARD / THE CANADIAN PRESS ARCHIVES Enlarge Image

Canadian Coast Guard icebreaker Louis S. St-Laurent sails Baffin Bay in July.

ARCTIC sea ice levels have reached their third-lowest level on record, opening a highway for northern mariners but causing concern for the mammals that live there.

Scientists at the U.S. National Snow and Ice Data Center in Colorado released their preliminary assessment Wednesday of minimum sea ice levels across the Arctic this year. The figure dropped to 4.76 million square kilometres, the third-lowest since satellites began keeping track. It is also nearly 40 per cent below the 20-year average.

"This is the third time in the satellite record that we've fallen below five million square kilometres for the minimum," said director Mark Serreze. "All of those have occurred in the last four years."

Last year's minimum was just over that threshold at 5.1 million square kilometres.

The centre released that information on the same day the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said that, at an average of 14.7 degrees, the first eight months of 2010 were tied with 1998 as the hottest on record to that point. The hottest year on record for the full year is 2005.

The 2010 figure for sea ice destroys early optimism that Arctic sea ice was recovering.

This summer has been one of the first on record during which both Canada's Northwest Passage and the Northeast Passage over Russia's Arctic coast have been ice-free at the same time.

That has opened the door to a single-season Arctic circumnavigation of the globe, a voyage that two vessels are currently attempting.

-- The Canadian Press

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition September 16, 2010 A11

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