Anyone else notice the time period for the observations in the graphic accompanying the full article? Looks like they're only showing observations through 2010 - which makes the model forecasts look relatively more accurate.

Anyone else really curious about what happens with that big crack on the Petermann this summer?

Looks like Michael's explanation corresponds to some work published in 2010: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2010-050 I'm sure the sill would interfere with this flow, but there does seem to be a mechanism that would draw warm, salty water into the fjord along the bottom while relatively fresh, cold water flows out along the surface.

I could be wrong, but it looks like the pressure ridge off Barrow is breaking up. Looks like a big hole in it: about 1/3 of the way in from the left edge of the cam image, there seems to be a chunk missing out of the ridge. A gap is showing up on the radar image, too. http://seaice.alaska.edu/gi/observatories/barrow_webcam

We seem to be getting into a lot of discussion about how the methodologies for CT area (and others) may not accurately reflect reality, actual conditions, ground truth, et al. With remote sensing, that is always a discussion, whether things are looking crazy (like now) or stable. The real question is whether or not the methodology has changed. If it hasn't, then the current high rate of change is the real discussion, not whether or not the actual numbers are 1% or 5% too high or too low. We presumably always see melt ponds at this time of year, right? The sensors presumably saw them (or didn't see them) as open ocean in past years, right? ...So, can we confirm that CT's methodology is the same? (We know to use a little caution with IJIS because of their sensor switch.)

I looked up blue ice a couple of days ago after the original comment, and Kris summed it up: "pure" ice with no tiny air bubbles is blue, and ice with air bubbles is white. My theory is that it's related to the high air temps: there's probably a constant sheet of water on top that's flowing down through every crack and crevice in the ice, displacing any air in all those little fissures. As the meltwater flows through those cracks into the sea underneath, it's replaced by new meltwater on top, so the cracks never "dry out". There's still a lot of air trapped in the ice, hence the light blue color. The beautiful, sapphire-blue of glacial ice is because much more of its air has been pushed out by pressure.

Apologies for whining, but has anyone heard anything from the CT guys? It's been two weeks without them.

Crandles: I noticed the brightness differences, too. My guess was that it's a sensor issue or a difference in image processing. (Looks like the "camera exposure" was reduced - either in the "camera" or in the processing phase.) Greenland is much brighter and details are much harder to make out in 2011 images. Presumably, the actual albedo of the ice sheet there hasn't changed much from last year to this year. Anyone with any real information on this, please chime in. If it's due to actual conditions, i.e. less snow, it will have a large impact on solar energy up there this spring/summer.

Very cool - thanks for the links. I'd only been looking at the NOAA pages: http://www.arctic.noaa.gov/gallery_np.html Nothing there so far.

Has anyone seen anything about the North Pole web cams for this year? They went up about this time last year; haven't seen any news about them, and there's nothing on their site.

I'm not taking the time to do any sort of analysis on this, but this late max appears to be part of a trend toward low late-winter/early-melt-season anomalies. Looking at the CT "tale of the tape", there appears to be a seasonal (and usually annual) maximum on the anomaly line around March or April since 2005. My guess is that it's thinner ice being spread out more before melt and real fragmentation kick in. Any other ideas?

With all the chatter about cold continents, I was curious about Great Lakes ice, but Yvan beat me to it. Here's another nugget: NYPA and OPG removed the ice boom protecting the intakes at the Niagara power station very early this year due to lack of ice. http://online.wsj.com/article/AP38eda65455324617979dfcd75821644f.html

Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I think we're within two weeks of maximum Arctic ice area, and we're 122M sq km shy of the previous CT record for lowest max.