While the Arctic ice starts to break the record of its minimum extent ever recorded, the polar opposite of the Antarctic ice grows.
southern hemisphere is about to end the cold season and measurements indicate that the growth of the maximum extension of the ice surface continues. The rate is calculated by the 0.6% over a decade and we are close to a record 20 million sq km reached in 1970.
At the same time, this September could break the record of the minimum extent of Arctic ice, record recorded just a year ago, with the final opening of the passage to the northwest and the ability to circumnavigate the North Pole, passing above the coast of Canada, Alaska, Greenland and Siberia.
For climatologists this apparent strangeness is not difficult to explain and does not disprove the global warming.
The fundamental difference is that the Arctic is an expanse of ice floating in the ocean and thus affected much of the heat carried by winds and current coming from the south instead of Antarctica is a continent with its own climate. Climate scientists hypothesize, for example, that warmer air can increase the snowfall on the continent.
"Climate models have long predicted that the Arctic would warm more rapidly as the Antarctic would be stable for longer," said Ted Maksym, the British Antarctic Survey at the British weekly science magazine New Scientist. But scientists warn that the turning point for the sixth continent could be close.
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