With the circumpolar vortex having retreated back to circling the pole, the cold air is staying up top and helping to expand both the extent and more importantly the thickness of the ice cap.
quick note: the thickness is more important because of the way ice melts. As any good bartender knows, it's all about the ratio of surface area to volume, a block of ice will melt slower than shavings.
The latest ice map from the Danish Meteorological Institute has three points of interest, two positive, one negative. First up the Bering Straits, top center in this view, have the thickest ice they've seen in at least three years:
Second, the volume (thickness x extent) which had been running at the lowest level in the last five years is now at the fourth-lowest level of the last five years, giving more ice a chance to get through the summer and become second-year ice.
The negative can be seen in this map from the same date in 2019. Although the overall current situation is better than it was two years ago, the ice between Greenland and the Svalbard archipelago at 20° east longitude has not filled in:
This is negative because the prevailing ice drift is from the Bering Strait and out the Fram Strait into the North Atlantic. It is best for the ice cap if there is a fat plug to bottle-up the ice above the 80th parallel.
The best case scenario would of course be a solid sheet of ice so the polar bears can walk over from Greenland to visit their cousins and maybe harass some Norwegians.
Two other negatives for this summer and maybe next are that the Central European heatwave expected in May and June will again extend north to Scandinavia, see:
A Couple Reasons To Look For A Hot Summer, Maybe Even Drought In Central Europe This Year
And:
