The Great Lakes Are Nearly Ice-Free
Generally warmer weather and El Niño this year have led to the lowest ice cover over the lakes since records began
The Great Lakes, which are normally covered by a frozen sheath this time of year, are nearly completely ice-free this winter.
Lakes Erie and Ontario are effectively without ice, while the amount of ice covering all the lakes taken together is the lowest since records began in 1973.
Ice coverage of the basin measured 2.7% on Feb. 11, far less than the peak of around 53% typically found in late February or early March, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which reviewed satellite images to take the measurements.
“We’ve crossed a threshold in which we are at a historic low for ice cover for the Great Lakes as a whole,” said Bryan Mroczka, a physical scientist and meteorologist at NOAA’s Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory in Ann Arbor, Mich.
 Shippers expect they will have to do more dredging in the spring because there hasn’t been ice to stop storms from pushing sediments along shorelines into the harbors. Photo: Mert Alper Dervis/Anadolu/Getty Images
The effects of the El Niño weather pattern have made this winter especially warm, impeding the buildup of ice, Mroczka said.
Over the long term, climate change has largely driven a drop in Great Lakes ice cover during winters, according to researchers, though the amount of coverage has gone up and down from year to year. The annual maximum ice coverage has fallen 5% a decade for a total of 25% between 1973 and 2023.
Shippers would usually welcome the absence of ice patches obstructing their routes, but they aren’t happy with this season’s developments.
Percentage ice concentration in the Great LakesSource: NOAANote: Years are end of season. Omits Feb. 29 data on leap years.
They aren’t able to take advantage of the conditions because a system of locks located between Michigan and Ontario, known as the Soo Locks, close every winter for ice and won’t reopen this season until March 25, according to Eric Peace, vice president of the Lake Carriers’ Association trade group.
Meanwhile, the shippers expect they will have to do more dredging in the spring, Peace said, because there hasn’t been ice to stop storms from pushing sediments along the shorelines into the harbors.
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There have already been reports of sediment clogging harbors in eastern Lake Michigan and southern Lake Erie, Peace said.
The Great Lakes—Erie, Huron, Michigan, Ontario and Superior—border eight U.S. states and Ontario, Canada. They are the largest freshwater lake system on Earth, and provide drinking water for 10% of the U.S. population, according to the Great Lakes Commission.
It might be too late for ice to form over the Great Lakes. Temperatures have stayed relatively warm across the Great Lakes and Upper Midwest despite a cold spell during mid-January, said Karin Gleason, monitoring section chief at NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information. “So ice opportunities climatologically speaking are going to start dwindling over the course of the next couple of months,” she said.
Write to Eric Niiler at eric.niiler@wsj.com |
