January 4, 2024:  The sea ice has continued to increase, but at a greater rate of 3.93% (from last week’s growth rate of 2.44%), from the level on 12/28/2023 of 12.921 M km² to 13.449 M km² for this week. It is a bit hard to see the new 2024 line, but it is there and will become more easily read in the next couple of weeks.

The negative sea ice anomaly this week was lower than the anomaly of -0.244 M km² on 12/28/2023 to a lesser negative anomaly of -0.075 M km² on 01/04/2024, and so less anomalously negative for this time of year.