Worsening By The Minute: Overheated Arctic Sign Of Climate Change To 'Vicious Circle'

The drastic climate change has been causing problems to every living creature on the planet. On Thursday, scientists said that the scary high temperatures in the Arctic driven by heat-packed oceans and winds going northward have been reinforced by a "vicious circle" of climate change.

In a recent report published in Japan Times, the Danish Meteorological Institute, which tracks hourly changes in Arctic weather, explained that the air above the polar ice cap has been 9 to 12 degrees Celsius above average over the last four weeks.

The temperatures recorded above the North Pole last week was 0 degree, a full 20 degrees Celsius above the levels that are typical for mid-November, explained Martin Stendel, a DMI climate researcher based in Copenhagen. "This is by far the highest recorded" in the era of satellite data, starting in 1979, he said.

At this time of year, open oceans should be freezing again. But that has not been happening at the usual pace, said Stendel. "Not only was the ice not growing as it would normally, there was further melting due to warm air coming in," he continued.

The U.S. National Snow and Ice Data Center reported that the extent of ice in October was about 6.4 million square kilometers (2.5 million square miles), which is the lowest in record to date. Phys.Org also reported that on Sep. 16, the ice cover at the top of the globe decreased in size to its smallest area in 2016 at about 4.14 million sq km or 1.6 million sq mi.

There have been several factors that have been identified, which have caused the Arctic to overheat since late October, scientists said. The most immediate are warm winds sweeping up from Western Europe and off the west coast of Africa.

"The winds carrying this heat is a temporary-and fairly unprecedented-weather phenomenon," said Valerie Masson Delmotte, a scientist at the Climate and Environment Sciences Laboratory in Paris. Delmotte also said that these winds have only slowed on Thursday.

Meanwhile, the second contributing factor that experts have identified is the Pacific Ocean El Niño that slowed down earlier this year after giving off a couple of tenths of degree of additional warming into the atmosphere.

However, experts agreed that reinforcing these periodic, if powerful, drivers is the biggest contributor of all: global warming. Man-made climate change caused by heat to trap greenhouse gases has already pushed up Earth's average surface temperature by 1.0 C since the pre-industrial era.

In the Arctic, the pace of warming has been twice as fast, caused in part by a vicious circle that scientists call "positive feedback."

It is also important to note that approximately 80 percent of solar radiation bounces back into space when it falls on white snow and ice. But when those rays hit the sea -- far more of which is now exposed -- 80 percent of that warmth is absorbed into the water.

"If you look at the extent of sea ice, then you can see the vicious circle right away, because there's a clear downward trend," said Stendel. The loss of ice could have far-reaching consequences.

"It amplifies global warming in general and increases warming, especially in nearby continents," Delmotte added.