~Wrangel Island Northwards sea ice 'panhandle' to main pack disintegrating rapidly.
~North Pole will have messed up pack ice mixed with open water drifting there soon
Wrangel Island Northwards very wide ice bridge likely with thicker sea ice multiple points of fusion were reached a fews days later than adjoining open water areas. As the 'handle' sea ice to pack structure obliterates more and more daily, close to 800,000 km2 will be likely gone come minima.
This makes minima at least
4.2 5.2 million square kilometres.
Since I did not estimate other areas, 2016 being #2 position all time minima is now in range. Looking at past melts having at least 1.65 million sea ice loss till minima, #2 position is now a possibility, especially given the current daily rate melt.
Despite not so dense cloud coverage, sea ice remote sensing observations, although not easy, are possible. Fram Strait has major Eastward winds pushing its melt zone further to the North Atlantic. We can note a gradual loosening of sea ice North of East Siberian and Chukchi seas practically all the way to the Pole. The rate of sea ice vanishing in this sector will dictate if the North Pole will be accessible to none icebreaker ships, particularly from the Pacific side of the Pole. The Transpolar Drift Stream appears to have moved near North Pole open water zone further along its usual path,
leading to conclude that all this messed up pack ice from the South East Russian side along with open water will be over the North Pole quite soon. Next few days will have Anticyclone North of Beaufort, an already strong stubborn gyre current will be re-energized a bit more as well. WDAugust 4 2016
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