Arctic sea ice cover at record low
September 11, 2007
BOULDER, Colorado (CNN) -- Ice cover in the Arctic Ocean, long held to be an early warning of a changing climate, has shattered the all-time low record this summer, according to scientists from the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder. It is possible that Arctic sea ice could decline even further this year before the onset of winter.
Using satellite data and imagery, NSIDC now estimates the Arctic ice pack covers 4.24 million square kilometers (1.63 million square miles) -- equal to just less than half the size of the United States. This figure is about 20 percent less than the previous all-time low record of 5.32 million square kilometers (2.05 million square miles) set in September 2005
Mark Serreze, senior research scientist at NSIDC, termed the decline "astounding."
"It's almost an exclamation point on the pronounced ice loss we've seen in the past 30 years," he said.
Most researchers had anticipated that the complete disappearance of the Arctic ice pack during summer months would happen after the year 2070, he said, but now, "losing summer sea ice cover by 2030 is not unreasonable."
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