Research aircraft from the Alfred Wegener Institute have been surveying the ice-covered Arctic Ocean for 30 years. The immense effort of the past 52 expeditions has paid off: 40,000 km of measurement
In recent days, the development of the ice cover north of Greenland has attracted considerable attention: within a few weeks, an ice-free strip up to 100 km wide has formed along the coast (Fig.1). Th
The thickness of sea ice determines the heat exchange between the ocean and the atmosphere as well as the resistance against the deforming forces of wind and ocean currents. Already a thin layer of se
The standard unit used for the sea-ice volume is thousands of cubic kilometres, and offers a better measure of the state of Arctic sea ice than the extent, since the volume includes the thickness of t
On 16 May, RV Polarstern left the MOSAiC floe, which an international team of experts has been researching since last October, to pick up the crew for the next leg of the expedition off the coast of S
CryoSat-2, a radar altimeter satellite of the European Space Agency (ESA), had its eighth birthday on April 8, 2018. Observations from CryoSat-2 add vital information on sea ice thickness to other sat
While the Arctic sea ice continues to decline, a glance at the Southern Ocean reveals a different picture: in recent years and decades, the sea-ice extent has increased slightly – albeit with clearly
After a two-year break, this year experts from the Alfred Wegener Institute, Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research (AWI) were able to return to Station Nord in northeast Greenland, to resume
Background Satellite altimeters measure how much the sea-ice surface floats above the water level. This parameter is called freeboard and it is further converted into sea-ice thickness. This calculati
According to the Copernicus Climate Change Service (climate change service of the European Commission and European Space Agency), in Europe the summer months June to August were the hottest since the
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