Sea ice in the Arctic appears to have hit its annual maximum extent after growing through the fall and winter. The 2021 wintertime extent reached on March 21 ties with 2007's as the seventh-smallest extent of winter sea ice in the satellite record, according to scientists at the NASA-supported National Snow and Ice Data Center and NASA.
This year's maximum extent peaked at 5.70 million square miles (14.77 million square kilometers) and is 340,000 square miles (880,000 square kilometers) below the 1981 to 2010 average maximum - equivalent to missing an area of ice larger than the state of Texas and Florida combined.
This image, created at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, was created using data provided by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), acquired by the Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer 2 (AMSR2) instrument aboard the Global Change Observation Mission 1st-Water "SHIZUKU" (GCOM-W1) satellite.
Related Links
National Snow and Ice Data Center
Beyond the Ice Age
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Russia stages fresh military drills in the Arctic
Moscow (AFP) March 30, 2021
Russia was holding fresh military exercises on Tuesday in the Arctic, a territory of growing importance for Moscow as it vies for regional dominance with rivals including the United States.
Tensions between the West and Russia have led both sides to beef up their militaries in the remote High North, an area believed to be rich in natural resources and where melting ice has opened up new shipping routes.
The Russian military on March 20 launched massive Arctic manoeuvres near Alexandra Land, par ... read more
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