Arctic drift ice: February cover at fourth lowest extent since 1979

The arctic drift ice cover usually reaches its maximum distribution in mid March. In 2014, however, the February extent was far behind the normal values. The average was 14.4 million square kilometres or 910,000 million square kilometres less than the long-term average. This puts February 2014 on the fourth place in the negativenstatistics since 1979, the beginning of systematic observations.

February 2005 holds so far the absolute negative rekord.

In February 2014, the ice cover grew with about 14,900 square kilometres per day. The corresponding long-term value is, however, 20,300 square kilometres. Short-term fluctuations against the growing trend in February are due to ice movement rather than melting.

In February 2014, the temperatures in large parts of the Arctic were 4 to 8 degrees above the long-term average.

Source: Snow and Ice Data Centre