NASA GSFC Current State of Sea Ice Cover Images

The Cryospheric Sciences Laboratory at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center maintains a website providing recent information on the state of sea ice cover from satellite observations of sea ice concentration. The website features a set of 8 images including maps, plots, and animations of recent sea ice extent and area for the Northern (Arctic) and Southern (Antarctic) Hemispheres placed in context with historical sea ice conditions. The images on the website are updated approximately twice weekly, displaying the most recent data. The files archived here provide public access to past images featured on the website. The most recent images and detailed data information can be found at the website below. 

NASA GSFC Current State of Sea Ice Cover website: https://earth.gsfc.nasa.gov/cryo/data/current-state-sea-ice-cover

File Description

This file set contains images dating from 1 July 2020 - present. Images from 2020 - 2023 are stored in one .zip file per year containing separate .zip files for each image update (~2 per week). More recent images (2024 - present) are added as separate .zip files containing images for each week (2 image sets per file). Within the .zip files are the individual image files corresponding to Figures 1-8 on the website. Image filenames are as described below.

.zip files

csosi_images_YYYY.zip - is a .zip file containing all sets of image files (as separate .zip files) for the given year (YYYY). 

csosi_images_YYYYMMDD_week.zip - is a .zip file containing sets of image files (as separate .zip files) for the week beginning with the date YYYYMMDD.

images_YYYYMMDD.zip - is a .zip file containing 8 images for the given date (YYYYMMDD). 

Image Filenames 

Northern Hemisphere

NH_decadal_plot_YYYYMMDD.png - (Figure 1) Plot of decadal averages of historic sea ice extent and area compared to recent sea ice extent and area (through YYYYMMDD) for the Northern Hemisphere. 

NH_min_max_image_YYYYMMDD.png - (Figure 2) Map of daily Northen Hemisphere sea ice concentration (on YYYYMMDD) with contours for the minimum and maximum sea ice extent for the date from the historical record. 

NH_yearly_plot_YYYYMMDD.png - (Figure 3) Plot of daily average Northern Hemisphere sea ice extent and area for the current year (through YYYYMMDD) compared to the previous 11 years. 

NH_YYYYMMDD_YYYYMMDD_B04_AMSRU2_12km_cb2_cln_bw_labs_v2.gif - (Figure 4) Animated map of daily Northern Hemisphere sea ice concentration for a two week period. Dates in the filename correspond to the date range of data shown in the animation. 

Southern Hemisphere

SH_decadal_plot_YYYYMMDD.png - (Figure 5) Plot of decadal averages of historic sea ice extent and area compared to recent sea ice extent and area (through YYYYMMDD) for the Southern Hemisphere. 

SH_min_max_image_YYYYMMDD.png - (Figure 6) Map of daily Southern Hemisphere sea ice concentration (on YYYYMMDD) with contours for the minimum and maximum sea ice extent for the date from the historical record. 

SH_yearly_plot_YYYYMMDD.png - (Figure 7) Plot of daily average Southern Hemisphere sea ice extent and area for the current year (through YYYYMMDD) compared to the previous 11 years. 

SH_YYYYMMDD_YYYYMMDD_B04_AMSRU2_12km_cb2_cln_bw_labs_v2.gif - (Figure 8) Animated map of daily Southern Hemisphere sea ice concentration for a two week period. Dates in the filename correspond to the date range of data shown in the animation.