The sea ice extent is nearly a million square miles below the long-term average for late June.
Antarctic sea ice concentration on June 27, 2023, with white representing solid ice and dark blue representing open ocean. The median ice edge for 1981–2010 is drawn in orange. (Credit: Map by NOAA Climate.gov, based on data from the National Snow and Ice Data Center) As Antarctica plunges deeper and deeper into winter at this time of year, the frigid continent's surrounding lid of floating sea ice should be expanding rapidly. But this year, sea ice has been growing at an agonizingly sluggish pace that has been setting records day after day. "In the midst of its winter growth phase, Antarctic sea ice has reached a record smashing-low extent for this time of year," according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. "Sea ice extent is approaching a half a million square miles below the previous lowest extent, observed in 2022." Compared to the long-term average for this time of year, the seas around Antarctica were missing a million square miles of floating sea ice on June 27. That's an area equal to four times the state of Texas. Antarctic sea ice has been growing so anemically this winter that it has been setting records for lows on a daily basis since April. Meanwhile, in the Arctic… It's now summer in the Northern Hemisphere, and sea ice in the Arctic has been shrinking. As temperatures warm, this is only natural. But Arctic sea ice has been shrinking more rapidly than normal. Although not at a record low, the extent of the region's sea ice as of June 29 was 424,712 square miles below the 1981-2010 average — an area more than two and a half times the size of California. Sea ice extent anomalies during 2023 for the Arctic and Antarctic (as of June 29, 2023) compared to the 1981-2010…