During the winter of 2007-2008, a lot of multi-year ice (MYI) blew out into the North Atlantic and melted. Right now, the Arctic has nearly as much area of MYI as it did in 1995.

The image below was modified from the original NSIDC image to account for the recent Arctic ice birthday.

Modified NSIDC graph

The key to how much gain/loss of MYI we see in the Spring, is what the wind does this winter. So far, temperatures have been colder than any year since 2004 – so we will have to keep an eye on the winds to see what happens to the new ice.

http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/plots/meanTarchive/meanT_2010.png