Video: North Pole ice melts into small lake
A time-lapse video from a webcam set up by the North Pole Environmental Observatory shows ice from the North Pole melting and forming a growing lake.
According to the North Pole Environmental Observatory, which has monitored the state of the Arctic sea ice since 2000, the North Pole has been melting since at least 2002.
July is normally the warmest month but temperatures are 1 to 3 degrees above average this year.
LiveScience reports that "meltwater ponds" appear more easily on young, thin ice, which now makes up more than half of the Arctic sea ice.
But James Morison, the principal investigator for the North Pole Environmental Observatory, told The Atlantic that he has seen worse.
"I have seen much more extensive ponding," he said. "Because we use wide angle lenses the melt pond looks much bigger than it is."
Last year's melting of the ice was record-breaking and this year's maximum winter coverage was the sixth-lowest since satellite observations began in the 1970s.
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