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the arctic is one of the most rapidly

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changing regions on the planet and it's

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warming about two to three times faster

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than the rest of the globe

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there is a lot going on in the arctic

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there are some really significant

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wildfires happening right now many of

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them in siberia and we're seeing

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tremendous amount of carbon emissions in

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the region each year essentially we keep

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seeing new record high temperatures

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being set and new record low sea ice

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extents there's been this kind of

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long-term decline in the sea ice extent

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over the last four decades sea ice is

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this really dynamic type of ice it's the

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ice that forms and melts in the arctic

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ocean so you get new ice forming and

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melting each year

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for about 40 years now we've been able

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to actually

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use satellites to look at the area of

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the ice on the arctic ocean and one of

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the things we're noticing from that is

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when we get to the summer each year you

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get this minimum of sea ice so it covers

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the least area of the arctic ocean

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what we're seeing is that that minimum

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is getting increasingly less over the

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last four decades and we are losing a

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large amount of sea ice every year if

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you look at the trends

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[Music]

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and what we saw this year there's kind

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of been a heat wave essentially in the

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arctic so

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temperatures at the north pole were

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about 10 to 15 degrees fahrenheit higher

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than the average since the 1980s for

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that time of year

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something that i kind of think about

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every year now whenever the sea ice

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minimum happens is that the 13 lowest

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sea ice extents on record have occurred

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sea ice is kind of this big protective

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blanket of bright ice that sits on the

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arctic ocean and it reflects the sun's

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heat it insulates the cool atmosphere

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from the warmer ocean

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and if you start melting away that sea

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ice you're going to warm the atmosphere

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more and it's going to affect

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temperature winds and weather not just

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in the arctic but globally as well

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the way i kind of think about it is

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if you're taking away this big

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protective blanket from the arctic

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you're essentially doing a massive

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science experiment almost on the planet

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and it's not necessarily an experiment

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we are seeing more melt in the arctic we

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are seeing earlier melt and

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later freeze up

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we're combining those with the models

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that can predict what's going to happen

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in the future and seeing that perhaps

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the arctic is going to become sea ice

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there's a lot of talk for example about

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kind of the temperatures in siberia and

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permafrost melting and

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fires in siberia and that's really

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unusual and that's because it was so

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much warmer this year than it has been

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temperatures in the arctic are

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increasing three times as much as

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elsewhere in the world so temperature

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definitely can play a role in the

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wildfires that we're seeing there this

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year especially has been significant for

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siberia in the russian arctic uh where

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there's a town up there that's gone over

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100 degrees fahrenheit and which they

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never see happen and also that's the

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same region where there's there have

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been some really significant wildfires

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and the smoke from those wildfires can

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be seen for

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many miles but the problem that we're

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starting to see is that these fires are

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happening more frequently and they're

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more severe than they have been in past

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decades we're getting warmer

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temperatures drier fuels and more

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lightning which is causing more fires

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generally in the arctic year by year

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arctic wildfires

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happen in these regions that have really

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thick organic soils and you say wait

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soil burns what

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well it's soil but it's organic material

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juice it's like old leaves and old moss

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and it kind of gets compacted and it can

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really burn

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but it's taken tens of thousands years

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to develop that soil and so when it

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burns you're releasing a huge amount of

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carbon into the atmosphere all at once

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as a scientist when i look at these

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trends i am concerned uh where are we

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gonna go from here that is why we keep

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studying this so nasa has a number of

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field campaigns that are trying to

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understand arctic processes

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and i think that it's really important

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that we keep up the study and

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try to better understand what is