Sea ice covers about 25 million square kilometres of the earth. Since Azerbaijan is far
away from polar regions, most of us probably haven’t seen sea ice. Although it may not
directly affect us, sea ice is very important for our planet because it influences climate,
wildlife and people who live in the Arctic.
Scientists have been studying changes in the Arctic Sea ice for more than 100 years. The
study
shows that the amount of the Arctic Sea ice has been decreasing for several decades.
In fact, the Arctic has lost 75% of its summer sea ice over the past three decades. In some
years, global warming has caused different amounts of sea ice to disappear. Even though ice
levels may be different from year to year, summer sea ice has been disappearing at a rate of
around 2,5% a year.