Breakup events and the future of the Arctic sea ice
One of the more alarming results of the study is that these breakup events can accelerate the loss of multi-year ice in the Beaufort Sea. Jonathan Rheinlænder and his colleagues found that the ice cover becomes more mobile due to the breakup, and more sea ice is transported out of the region than if no breakup event had occurred. “Overall, strong breakup events lead to a thinner and weaker ice cover at the end of the winter season, which makes it even more vulnerable to melting during summer”, says Jonathan Rheinlænder. They also found that as the ice cover becomes thinner, weaker winds can also break up the sea-ice cover. This means that we might see more large breakup events in the future, potentially leading to sea ice starting to melt earlier in the year and accelerating the loss of sea ice in the Arctic. And this is bad news.
Societal relevance of better understanding breakup events
The Arctic sea ice is an important factor influencing the global climate. Global climate models, that researchers use to make projections for the future, cannot capture small-scale processes such as fractures occurring in the ice cover, for example caused by such massive breakup events as in 2013. This means that the effects of such events are not captured in the models, making the projections less reliable. With such breakup events likely becoming more common in the future, it will become even more important to include these processes into global climate models to improve future projections of Arctic sea ice and the effects on the global climate. “Our results suggest that in order to capture such events we need better atmospheric models as well as improving sea ice models used in the climate models”, says Jonathan Rheinlænder.
Improved knowledge on these breakup events will also help to improve weather prediction in the Arctic and provide critical input to people living in the coastal regions. Coastal communities relying on the sea ice as hunting and fishing grounds need to know when and where the ice cover will break up. In addition, safe navigation through ice-affected waters for example for shipping or other offshore activities is only possible with detailed information about where there is ice and where there is open water.
Even though most people live far away from the Arctic, what happens there affects all of us. The sea ice is becoming more vulnerable to melting, and breakups are speeding up that process. To be able to reliably predict sea-ice behaviour, including breakup events, is beneficial both on the local scale, as well as on the global scale, and the sea ice model neXtSIM has once again proven to be valuable for this purpose.
