"Scientists are seeing surprising melting in Earth’s polar regions at times they don’t expect, like winter, and in places they don’t expect, like eastern Antarctica," writes the Associated Press. ...

..."The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Tuesday released its annual Arctic report card, detailing the second warmest year on record in the Arctic and problems, including record low winter sea ice in parts of the region, increased toxic algal blooms, which are normally a warm water phenomenon, and weather changes in the rest of the country attributable to what’s happening in the far North. ...

..."'In February the Bering Sea “lost an area of ice the area of Idaho,' said Dartmouth engineering professor Donald Perovich, a report card co-author.

"This is a problem because the oldest and thickest sea ice is down 95 percent from 30 years ago. In 1985, about one-sixth of Arctic sea ice was thick multi-year ice, now it is maybe one-hundredth, Perovich said."

(Picked up by U.S. News & World Report, The Washington Post, The New York Times, The Inquirer.)