Delving into the relationship between autumn Arctic sea ice and central–eastern Eurasian winter climate

Abstract

Whether recent Arctic sea ice loss is responsible for recent severe winters over mid-latitude continents has emerged as a major debate among climate scientists owing to short records of observations and large internal variability in mid- and high-latitudes. In this study, the authors divide the evolution of autumn Arctic sea ice extent during 1979–2014 into three epochs, 1979–1986 (high), 1987–2006 (moderate), and 2007–2014 (low), using a regime shift identification method. The authors then compare the associations between autumn Arctic sea ice and winter climate anomalies over central and eastern Eurasia for the three epochs with a focus on extreme events. The results show robust and detectable signals of Arctic sea ice loss in weather and climate over western Siberia and East Asia. Associated with sea ice loss, the latitude (speed) of the jet stream shifts southward (reduces), the wave extent amplifies, and blocking high events increase over the Ural Mountains, leading to increased frequency of cold air outbreaks extending from central Asia to northeast China. These associations bear a high degree of similarity to the observed atmospheric anomalies during the low sea ice epoch. By contrast, the patterns of atmospheric anomalies for the high sea ice epoch are different from those congruent with sea ice variability, which is related to the persistent negative phase of the Arctic Oscillation.