Science & Technology

Antarctic sea ice hits record high levels

By T.K. Randall
October 10, 2014

Image: Antarctica - Petermann Island
Credit: W. Bulach / CC BY-SA 4.0 (adapted) As average global temperatures continue to climb there is something unexpected taking place in the one place that you would expect to be hit the hardest by climate change.

According to NASA's latest data, the sea ice around Antarctica has reached its highest level since satellite records began.

"We are seeing overall temperatures warming around the globe, so you would expect to see ice loss," said scientist Dr. Walt Meier.While sea ice as a whole has seen a sustained downward trend over the last few years, the National Snow and Ice Data Center reported that the sea ice around Antarctica was now in excess of 7.72 million square miles, far more than the average of 7.23 million recorded between 1981 and 2010.

"When we think about global warming we would expect intuitively that ice should also be declining in the Antarctic region as in the Arctic," said NASA's Josefino Comiso.

"But station and satellite data currently show that the trends in surface temperature are most positive in the Arctic while in the Antarctic region the trends are a mixture of positive and negative trends."

Source: CBS News

Tags: Antarctica, Ice, Global Warming