Declining Sea Ice levels - 09/06/2015

There is some discussion about the validity of the following graph which contradicts reports of sea ice being at fourth lowest levels on record.

There has been a cyclone moving through the region and the source appears to be quite legitimate - Arctic Regional Ocean Observing System

Arctic Sea Ice

SEASONAL ICE EXTENT IN Mill SQ.Km

DAILY ICE MAP FROM AMSR2, UB-IUP

http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/

Steady decline, seasonal minimum approaching

2 September, 2015

August saw a remarkably steady decline in Arctic sea ice extent, at a rate slightly faster than the long-term average. Forecasts show that this year’s minimum sea ice extent, which typically occurs in mid to late September, is likely to be the third or fourth lowest in the satellite record. All four of the lowest extents have occurred since 2007. In mid-August, Antarctic sea ice extent began to trend below the 1981 to 2010 average for the first time since November 2011.

Overview of conditions

Figure 1. Arctic sea ice extent for August 2015 was 5.61 million square kilometers (2.16 million square miles). The magenta line shows the 1981 to 2010 median extent for that month. The black cross indicates the geographic North Pole. Sea Ice Index data.About the data

Credit: National Snow and Ice Data Center

High-resolution image

Average sea ice extent for August 2015 was 5.61 million square kilometers (2.16 million square miles), the fourth lowest August extent in the satellite record. This is 1.61 million square kilometers (621,000 square miles) below the 1981 to 2010 average for the month, and 900,000 square kilometers (350,000 square miles) above the record low for August, set in 2012.

The rapid pace of daily ice loss seen in late July 2015 slowed somewhat in August. The pace increased slightly toward the end of the month, so that by August 31 Arctic sea ice extent was only slightly greater than on the same date in 2007 and 2011. The ice is currently tracking lower than two standard deviations below the 1981 to 2010 long-term average.

Sea ice extent remains below average in nearly every sector except for Baffin Bay and Hudson Bay, where some ice persists in sheltered coastal areas. A striking feature of the late 2015 melt season are the extensive regions of low-concentration ice (less than 70% ice cover) in the Beaufort Sea. A few patches of multi-year sea ice surrounded by open water remain in the central Beaufort Sea.

Arctic Ice concentration 09 05 2015 

The slider color coded scale shows that the pink is about a 15% concentration of ice. "Our Sea Ice Index products show ice concentration as a percentage. A value of 0 means there is no ice, while a value of 100 means the region is completely covered by ice." National Snow and Ice Data Center

All about sea ice: Data: Terminology

https://earthdata.nasa.gov/labs/worldview/?p=arctic&l=MODIS_Aqua_CorrectedReflectance_TrueColor%2CMODIS_Terra_CorrectedReflectance_TrueColor%28opacity%3D0.68%29%2CAMSRE_Sea_Ice_Concentration_12km%2CMODIS_Aqua_Sea_Ice%2CMODIS_Terra_Sea_Ice%2CGraticule%2CReference_Labels%28hidden%29%2CReference_Features%28hidden%29%2CCoastlines&t=2015-09-05&v=-2857544.4375000004%2C-1377412.99609375