Tremendous loss of Arctic ice

Dear editor: Re: “No Arctic sea ice lost in 11 years” by Hank Bryce (Courier letters, Oct. 5).

Indeed, Hank Bryce was very surprised by your article of no ice loss especially since you are quoting from the National Snow and Ice Data Centre.

I, too, will use their data to refute your claim. The actual extent of surface ice is just one measurement of sea ice amount, to understand fully the loss of ice you have to take into account other parameters, such as ice thickness and age as well as absolute amount.

Sea ice has declined, in thickness, from 3.64 metres in 1980 to 1.89 metres by 2008.

Sea ice volume declined by 4,291 cubic kilometres at the end of summer and 1,479 cubic kilometres by the end of winter — years 2008 and 201-2012. Sea ice age: in 1987 57 per cent of ice pack was at least five years old and 25 per cent at least nine years old.

By 2007 only seven per cent was five years old and virtually none was nine years old. It made a comeback in 2013 to 2014, but overall multiple year ice continues to decline. The loss of ice in the arctic is disappearing at an increasing speed.

The last year the earth was cooler than the 20th century average was 1976. Since then, there has been a steady increase in overall temperature of our planet — IPPC, not a hiatus. Oceans dominate our planet NOAA, Hadley Centre, and Japanese Metrological Agency report that the ocean temperature has increased 0.12 degrees C per decade from 1998. The previous decade has exhibited a global average temperature higher than they have been for at least 75 per cent of the last 11,300 years.

In closing, Bryce is correct in his statement of extent of sea ice, but gives a rather incomplete picture of the true nature of what is truly happening.

There is actually a tremendous loss of ice. Barrie Pelland Kelowna