LOS ANGELES, March 23 (Xinhua) -- The Arctic winter sea ice in 2022 marks the 10th-lowest on record, NASA revealed on Tuesday.
According to NASA's National Snow and Ice Data Center, Arctic sea ice likely peaked for this year at 5.75 million square miles (14.88 million square kilometers) on Feb. 25.
This is roughly 297,300 square miles (770,000 square kilometers) below the 1981-2010 average maximum, which is equivalent to missing an area of ice slightly larger than Texas and Maine combined, said NASA.
Since satellites began reliably tracking sea ice in 1979, maximum extents in the Arctic have declined at a pace of about 13 percent per decade, according to NASA.
These trends are linked to warming caused by human activities such as emitting carbon dioxide, which traps heat in the atmosphere and causes temperatures to rise, according to the agency.
NASA's analysis also shows the Arctic is warming about three times faster than other regions. ■
