You may be surprised to learn that despite our cold start to the month, the Arctic is a different story. While we have been seeing temperatures average about 10 degrees below normal over the past week to 10 days, the Arctic has been well above normal.

Of course, warmer-than-normal Arctic air is still cold, and when it gets displaced into places like Minnesota, the result is below-normal temperatures for us.

The warm Arctic means sea ice, which develops in autumn and through the winter, is well below normal in its coverage and extent. In fact, this is the lowest amount of Arctic sea ice since we began keeping satellite records nearly five decades ago. We are narrowly behind 2016, the previous record low for early December.

Why does it matter, you might ask?

Well, besides affecting the e

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