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Each year, the Arctic sea ice expands in winter and then contracts in summer. However, this year, it has declined more than usual during the summer months and NASA has declared that it was the second lowest total recorded since the beginning of the records in 1978. The icecap was reduced to 4.15 million square kilometers in 2019, which is the second lowest record set in 2007 and again in 2016.
NASA said in a statement that in recent decades, air and water temperatures have been rising due to climate change.
And while efforts are underway to reduce the climate catastrophe, NASA said there was little evidence of an Arctic recovery.
Claire Parkinson, senior scientist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, said: "This year's low shows that there is no sign of recovery in sea ice cover.
"The long-term trend for the extent of Arctic sea ice has been definitely downward."
In the end, according to NASA, this could have consequences around the world.
The space agency said, "Changes in sea ice cover in the Arctic have very different consequences.
"Sea ice affects local ecosystems, regional and global climate conditions and ocean circulation."
Walt Meier, a sea ice researcher at the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC), who helped NASA in his research, said the situation could have been worse.
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Mr. Meier said, "It was an interesting melt season. At the beginning of August, we had record ice levels for this time of year. A new record minimum could have been proposed. "
Perhaps the most worrisome, according to Meier, is that there have been no adverse weather conditions that have affected sea ice levels in the Arctic.
For example, the European heat wave has been little revealed, which means that the ice has melted due to global warming.
Mr. Meier said, "When the fires in Siberia took hold at the end of July, the sun was already starting to fall in the Arctic. The effect of soot darkening the surface of the sea ice was not so important.
"The heat wave in Europe has definitively affected the loss of terrestrial ice in Greenland and also caused a melting spurt along the east coast of Greenland.
"But it's a place where sea ice is transported along the coast and melts fairly quickly anyway."
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