{"id":70629,"date":"2026-05-26T23:59:00","date_gmt":"2026-05-26T23:59:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/?p=70629"},"modified":"2026-05-29T18:52:58","modified_gmt":"2026-05-29T18:52:58","slug":"anomalously-deep-polar-low-pressure-system-north-of-greenland-and-ice-breakup-in-northern-baffin-bay","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/archives\/70629","title":{"rendered":"Anomalously deep polar low pressure system north of Greenland, and ice breakup in northern Baffin Bay"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><div style=\"width: 4144px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/images\/2026\/05\/260525_260526_noaa20_viirs_dayNightBand_winds_Arctic_anim.gif\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium\" src=\"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/images\/2026\/05\/260525_260526_noaa20_viirs_dayNightBand_winds_Arctic_anim.gif_fr000026.png\" width=\"4134\" height=\"4174\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">NOAA-20 VIIRS Day\/Night Band (0.7 \u00b5m) images with an overlay of satellite-derived Atmospheric Motion Vectors during the 25-26 May period (courtesy Rich Dworak, CIMSS) [click to play animated GIF]<\/p><\/div>CIMSS research scientist Rich Dworak sent along a sequence of NOAA-20 VIIRS Day\/Night Band images <em><strong>(above)<\/strong><\/em>\u00a0that included satellite-derived Atmospheric Motion Vectors &#8212; which depicted an <a href=\"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/images\/2026\/05\/260525_260526_meanSeaLevelPressureAnomaly_anim.gif\"><strong>anomalously deep<\/strong><\/a> polar low just north of Greenland during the 25-26 May 2026 period.<\/p>\n<p>Another feature of interest seen in the Day\/Night Band imagery was the breakup of ice in the northeastern portion of Baffin Bay &#8212; which was also evident in a Blended Ice Concentration product from the <a href=\"https:\/\/stratus.ssec.wisc.edu\/ice-products\/anibrowser\/?action=view_data&amp;params=version,region,parameter,range,date&amp;param_values=NOAA21-VIIRS,Arctic,SIC,Daily,20260526\"><strong>VIIRS Enterprise Ice Products<\/strong><\/a> site <em><strong>(below)<\/strong><\/em>. The ice-free <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/North_Water_Polynya\"><strong>North Water Polynya<\/strong><\/a> was also very apparent.<\/p>\n<p><div style=\"width: 1610px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/images\/2026\/05\/260525_260526_blendedSeaIceConcentration_Arctic_anim.gif\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium\" src=\"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/images\/2026\/05\/260525_260526_blendedSeaIceConcentration_Arctic_anim.gif\" width=\"1600\" height=\"1600\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Blended Sea Ice Concentration images on 25 May and 26 May [click to enlarge]<\/p><\/div>According to analysis products from the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.canada.ca\/en\/environment-climate-change\/services\/ice-forecasts-observations\/latest-conditions.html\"><strong>Canadian Ice Service<\/strong><\/a> <em><strong>(below)<\/strong><\/em>, the Ice Concentration was only 1\/10th to 3\/10ths in much of the northern part of Baffin Bay, with large areas of &lt;1\/10th ice concentration having icebergs within the North Water Polynya.<\/p>\n<p><div style=\"width: 1505px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/images\/2026\/05\/260525_iceStage_iceConcentration_Eastern_Arctic_anim.gif\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium\" src=\"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/images\/2026\/05\/260525_iceStage_iceConcentration_Eastern_Arctic_anim.gif\" width=\"1495\" height=\"2143\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Ice Stage and Ice Concentration on 25 May [click to enlarge]<\/p><\/div>The ice concentration departure from normal was substantially negative (shades of red) in northern and northeastern portions of Baffin Bay <em><strong>(below)<\/strong><\/em>.<\/p>\n<div style=\"width: 1124px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/images\/2026\/05\/260525_iceConcentrationDeparture_Eastern_Arctic.gif\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium\" src=\"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/images\/2026\/05\/260525_iceConcentrationDeparture_Eastern_Arctic.gif\" width=\"1114\" height=\"1462\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Ice Concentration Departure From Normal on 25 May [click to enlarge]<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>CIMSS research scientist Rich Dworak sent along a sequence of NOAA-20 VIIRS Day\/Night Band images (above)\u00a0that included satellite-derived Atmospheric Motion Vectors &#8212; which depicted an anomalously deep polar low just north of Greenland during the 25-26 May 2026 period. Another feature of interest seen in the Day\/Night Band imagery was the breakup of ice in [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":70643,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[37,108,78,25,48],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-70629","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arctic","category-cryosphere","category-noaa-20","category-satellite-winds","category-viirs"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70629","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=70629"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70629\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":70649,"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70629\/revisions\/70649"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/70643"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=70629"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=70629"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=70629"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}