56 participants of the 3rd FAMOS workshop (October 22-24, 2014) prepared outlooks for minimum sea ice conditions in 2015. Three variables where predicted:
- Spatial distribution of minimum sea ice extent in 2015 (Figure 1). We have digitized collected outlooks from maps showing ice edge (extent) provided by workshop participants. Thick dashed blue line shows ensemble mean outlook and indicates that in average participants predict a bit less ice in 2015 than was observed in 2014.
- Minimum ice extent in square km. See Figure 2 showing minimum ice extent in million square kilometers. These are individual outlooks prepared by all participants. Note that the majority of outlooks predict sea ice extent around 5 million square kilometers. There are two extremes in sea ice extent predictions: (a) minimum (less than 4 mil. square km) suggested by B. Rabe and absolute maximum (more than 6.5 mil. square km) provided by Lars Smedsrud. Figure 3 shows individual sea ice extent configurations (this is information from Figure 1 but with more details).
- Date of sea ice extent minimum in 2015 (Figure 4). The date of sea ice extent minimum ranges from September 10th (Linck-Rosenhaim) to September 24 (Smedsrud).
Results of these predictions will be discussed at 4th FAMOS workshop in November, 2015.
