Pacific, Not Arctic Ice Melting April 30

The image above shows the disappearing ice in the two Pacific basins over the last 16 days of April.  Okhotsk on the left melted steadily, losing 400k km2 of ice during this period, with only 260k km2 or 20% of its March maximum remaining. Bering Sea on the right actually gained 150k km2 ice extent up to 315k km2, before losing 215k km2 in the last four days, with only 100k km2 of ice left.

Meanwhile the Arctic core, Russian ice shelves and Canadian Archipelago remain frozen  The image above shows ice extent waxing and waning at the margins, especially in Bafffin Bay left of Greenland, and in Greenland Sea in the center.  Barents Sea on the right ended up about the same as it started this period.

The graph below shows how the April Arctic extents compared to the 12 year average and to some years of interest.
MASIE shows NH ice extents 800k km2 below the 12 year average at both the beginning and end of April.  SII ended the month slightly higher.  At this point 2019 is also tracking below 2018 and 2007.  The deficit is mostly due to open water in the Pacific basins.
The green line shows the average NH extents excluding Bering and Okhotsk ice,  The purple line shows the same for 2019, excluding B&O ice.  On day 90, the 12 year average included 1.7M km2 of B&O ice, which dropped to 0.9M by day 120.  In contrast 2019 started the month with 1.3M km2 of B&O ice, with only 0.3M left at month end.  As the table below will show, the over all deficit to average is 800k km2, and 550k km2 is due to Bering and Okhotsk melting.

Region	2019120	Day 120  Average	2019-Ave.	2007120	2019-2007
(0) Northern_Hemisphere	12845831	13636708	-790876	13108068	-262237
(1) Beaufort_Sea	1070463	1068049	2414	1059189	11273
(2) Chukchi_Sea	908742	957319	-48578	949246	-40504
(3) East_Siberian_Sea	1082230	1085731	-3500	1080176	2054
(4) Laptev_Sea	897845	891192	6653	875661	22184
(5) Kara_Sea	921837	912762	9075	864664	57173
(6) Barents_Sea	564996	551830	13166	396544	168452
(7) Greenland_Sea	544988	647270	-102283	644438	-99450
(8) Baffin_Bay_Gulf_of_St._Lawrence	1128210	1256132	-127923	1147115	-18905
(9) Canadian_Archipelago	853337	847923	5414	838032	15305
(10) Hudson_Bay	1255410	1243542	11868	1222074	33336
(11) Central_Arctic	3245152	3237039	8114	3241034	4118
(12) Bering_Sea	100108	515469	-415361	475489	-375381
(13) Baltic_Sea	9715	22746	-13032	14684	-4969
(14) Sea_of_Okhotsk	261111	396325	-135214	295743	-34632

Other than B&O losing ice, the other sizeable deficits to average are coming from Baffin Bay and Greenland Sea.  Of course, all of these basins will be ice-free as usual before September.

Drift ice in Okhotsk Sea at sunrise.