This May, the increase was only 2.87 million square kilometers (1.11 million square miles). In an average (1981 to 2010) May, Antarctic extent increases by 3.25 million square kilometers (1.25 million square miles). The Antarctic winter is approaching, so May and June are months of large increases in extent, but this year, extent is far lower than average for May (Figure 4a). Sea ice extent was particularly low in the Bellingshausen Sea, Weddell Sea, and western Ross Sea regions only the central Amundsen and Eastern Ross Seas were above the typical late May ice extent (Figure 4b). About the dataĭown south, Antarctic sea ice extent is at record low levels as assessed over the satellite record since 1978. The magenta line shows the 1981 to 2010 average extent for that month. Antarctic sea ice extent for May 2023 was 8.36 million square kilometers (3.23 million square miles).
May 2023 compared to previous yearsįigure 4b. By contrast, the unusually warm conditions over Hudson Bay can be linked to high sea level pressure (an anticyclonic circulation). This type of pattern is known to be generally associated with below average air temperatures over the Arctic Ocean. Most of the Arctic Ocean in May was dominated by below average sea level pressure, as much as 10 millibars below average north of the Laptev Sea (Figure 2b). Hudson Bay was also warmer than average, especially in the northwest part of the bay where temperatures were up to 8 degrees Celsius (14 degrees Fahrenheit) above average. Yellows and reds indicate high air pressure blues and purples indicate low pressure.Ĭredit: NSIDC courtesy NOAA Earth System Research Laboratory Physical Sciences LaboratoryĪir temperatures at the 925 millibar level (approximately 2,500 feet above the surface) were 1 to 4 degrees Celsius (2 to 7 degrees Fahrenheit) below average over much of the Arctic Ocean for the month as a whole, except the Barents, Kara, and Beaufort Seas, where temperatures were 2 to 6 degrees Celsius (4 to 11 degrees Fahrenheit) above average (Figure 2a).
This plot shows average sea level pressure in the Arctic in millibars for May 2023. The late increase in extent loss dropped the extent below the interdecile range after spending most of the month just above the lower part of the interdecile range. Overall, the Arctic lost 452,000 square kilometers (175,000 square miles) of ice from May 24 to May 31, compared the 1981 to 2010 average of 279,000 square kilometers (108,000 square miles) during the same interval. However, during the last week of the month, the rate of ice loss increased. From May 1 to May 24, extent dropped 963,000 square kilometers (372,000 square miles), compared to 1.12 million square kilometers (432,000 square miles) over the same interval in the 1981 to 2010 average. Through much of May, extent declined slightly slower than the 1981 to 2010 average (Figure 1b). The average extent was 460,000 square kilometers (178,000 square miles) below the 1981 to 2010 average and 910,000 square kilometers (351,000 square miles) above the record low May extent, which occurred in 2016. Sea Ice Index data.Ĭredit: National Snow and Ice Data CenterĪverage Arctic sea ice extent during May 2023 was 12.83 million square kilometers (4.95 million square miles) (Figure 1a), the thirteenth lowest May in the satellite record. The gray areas around the median line show the interquartile and interdecile ranges of the data. 2023 is shown in blue, 2022 in green, 2021 in orange, 2020 in brown, 2019 in magenta, and 2012 in dashed brown. The graph above shows Arctic sea ice extent as of June 4, 2023, along with daily ice extent data for four previous years and the record low year.
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