Not only has ice extent nearly returned to 1971 levels, but the bulk of the ice is perfectly situated to survive the winter.
Contrary to the blatant misinformation spread by alarmists, most of the ice volume loss from 1979-2007 was due to winter transport of older ice out the Arctic, rather than summer melt. That pattern has reversed in recent years, and the older thicker ice is making a significant comeback since 2009.
Melt season seems to be Over, Pictures from USCGC Healy showing new ice is starting to form. The New ice in this picture will be between 3 and 5 feet thick by next spring.
https://twitter.com/NJSnowFan/status/377413390055927808/photo/1
NIC reports a very slight decline in Arctic ice extent yesterday, to 5.81 M Sq. Kms. Interesting to note that the packed ice extent that had gone as low as 4.5 M late in Aug. has now built up to show 4.9 M now. That number exceeds both 2009 and 2010 packed ice, thought those 2 years are still running ahead on total extent. Yes, the recovery is remarkable, and we may even see an early minimum (ahead of Sept. 21-23).
FYI re Ice Extent Records
“Differences between the NIC ice chart sea ice record and the passive microwave sea ice
record are highly significant . . . We find a baseline difference in integrated ice
concentration coverage north of 45N of 3.85% ± 0.73% during November to May (ice chart concentrations are larger). In summer, the difference between the two sources of data rises to a maximum of 23% peaking in early August, equivalent to ice coverage the size of Greenland.”
http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1058&context=usdeptcommercepub
Russian map was updated today. Here’s the new one. It shows new ice forming in Archipelago.
http://www.aari.ru/resources/d0015/arctic/gif.en/2013/20130910.GIF