Bering Strait Ice is Basically Gone

Winters at the Bering Strait typically mean a whole lot of ice — but this year, there’s hardly any at all.

“The usually ice-covered Bering Strait is almost completely open water,” climate scientist Zack Labe told Mashable.

At its narrowest point, the Arctic strait between the U.S. and Russia is 55 miles across. The frigid waterway usually builds ice through the winter, reaching its greatest extent in late March and holds well into spring.

A new record low sea ice extent for the day of the year in the Bering Sea. pic.twitter.com/DuznyRcKV4

— Lars Kaleschke (@seaice_de) March 3, 2019

“There should be ice here until May,” Lars Kaleschke, a climate scientist at the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research, said.

But now, the ice is at its lowest point over a 40-year satellite record period, said Labe. And over the last two years, the ice cover in the Bering Strait has been considered exceptionally low.

This is because the Arctic is warming over twice as fast as the rest of the globe, leading to significant melting across much of the Arctic, even where the ice is the thickest, oldest, and most resilient.

Another 2019 Alaska #seaice factiod: sea ice extent in the Bering & Chukchi Seas has decreased by 360,000 km² since Jan 25th. That's right, an area the size of Montana has gone from (some) ice to (mostly all) water in six weeks. #Arctic #akwx @Climatologist49 @seaice_de @ZLabe pic.twitter.com/8PcPOQxKkH

— Rick Thoman (@AlaskaWx) March 4, 2019

“The 12 lowest extents in the satellite record have occurred in the last 12 years,” the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s 2018 Arctic report concluded.

This is especially noticeable in the Strait.

“In the long-term, temperatures in northern Alaska have been rising faster than anywhere else in the United States,” said Labe.