Earth ID: 3186

Minimum Sea Ice Extent (WMS)

Visualizations by Eric Sokolowsky Released on July 1, 2005

Each year, the ice covering the Arctic Ocean grows during the northern hemisphere winter and shrinks with the northern hemisphere summer. The ice extent is usually greatest during the month of March and is the least during the month of September. This image shows the average minimum extent of sea ice over the northern hemisphere during the month of September over 24 seasons, from 1979 - 2002. The red line shows the area where the average sea ice concentration is 15%.

These images show the minimum extent of sea ice in the northern hemisphere. There are several images available, including a transparent overlay, a background image from NASA's Blue Marble, and a composite image.

This product is available through our Web Map Service.

Visualization Credits

Eric Sokolowsky (GST): Lead Animator
Cindy Starr (Global Science and Technology, Inc.): Visualizer
Walt Meier (NSIDC): Scientist

Please give credit for this item to:
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio

Short URL to share this page:
https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/3186

Data Used:

Nimbus-7/SMMR

1979-2002

view all stories where this data set is used

DMSP/SSM/I/Sea Ice Climatology

1979-2002

view all stories where this data set is used

Note: While we identify the data sets used in these visualizations, we do not store any further details nor the data sets themselves on our site.

This item is part of this series:
WMS

Keywords:
DLESE >> Cryology
GCMD >> Earth Science >> Cryosphere >> Sea Ice >> Ice Extent
GCMD >> Earth Science >> Oceans >> Sea Ice >> Ice Extent
SVS >> Hyperwall
NASA Science >> Earth

GCMD keywords can be found on the Internet with the following citation: Olsen, L.M., G. Major, K. Shein, J. Scialdone, S. Ritz, T. Stevens, M. Morahan, A. Aleman, R. Vogel, S. Leicester, H. Weir, M. Meaux, S. Grebas, C.Solomon, M. Holland, T. Northcutt, R. A. Restrepo, R. Bilodeau, 2013. NASA/Global Change Master Directory (GCMD) Earth Science Keywords. Version 8.0.0.0.0