Areas of the ocean that have frozen are considered “sea ice,” and can vary from slushy, barely solid areas to sheets of ice that are meters thick. Since the late 1970s, satellites have been used to monitor both the extent and concentration of sea ice around the world, and the National Snow and Ice Data Center generates a sea ice extent analyses from this data. We have applied a smoothing algorithm to the original shapefiles accessed from NSIDC.
This app displays the monthly mean sea ice extent for the Arctic and Antarctic along with the historical median extent. Additionally, graphs are used to visualize the minimum and maximum extent for each year (top), and the monthly time series for each year (bottom). Use the top graph to select specific years to display in the map.
This app was designed by members of the ArcGIS Living Atlas of the World team.