On September 10th, the Arctic hit its annual summertime ice minimum. According to the National Snow and Ice Data Center, it was the second lowest summertime low since satellite record-keeping began. And as a series of new visualizations show, this trend is not going anywhere.
The Arctic is the fastest-warming region of our planet today, heating up at roughly twice the globally-averaged rate. And nothing illustrates the north pole’s hot flash as poignantly as sea ice, that thick mantle of shiny white stuff that blankets a region of the Arctic the size of the United States and Mexico combined during the winter that shrinks back down in the summer. Thanks to unseasonably warm winters, earlier spring thaws and long, hot summers, Arctic sea ice has been on a downward spiral since at least the ‘90s.
See the full post at Gizmodo.