TABLE 118. MAXIMUM AND MINIMUM AREAS OF OPEN WATER 

 m THOUSANDS OF SQUARE KM IN AUGUST EST SEAS 

 OF THE SOVIET ARCTIC 



Basing his work on the results of ship navigation in the Kara Sea and also. on certain biologi- 

 cal indications, Burke found that two periods may be distinguished for the ice of the Kara Sea: one 

 a thirty-year period, the other a three-year period. The warm thirty-year periods alternate with 

 cold thirty-year periods, and on the general cold or warm background every third year is com- 

 paratively low in ice quantity. 



Thus, according to Burke, the period from 1869 to 1898 was a warm one for the Kara Sea 

 and the following years were especially low in ice quantity: 1869, 1872, 1875, 1878, 1881, 1884, 

 1887, 1890, 1893, 1896. The period from 1899 through 1929 was a cold one, but the following 

 years were distinguished by comparatively low ice quantity: 1899, 1902, 1905, 1908, 1911, 1914, 

 1917, 1920, 1923, 1925, 1926. According to Burke, a warm period again began in 1929, and the 

 years 1929, 1932, 1935, etc. were distinguished by low quantity of ice. Thus Burke considered 

 that the warming of the Kara Sea will attain its maximum around 1943 and 1944 while cooling will 

 not commence until 1959. 



POINTS. 



^"hs 07080910 11 12 13 14 IS 16 17 IS 1920 1122 2324 



Figure 187 . Fluctuations of ice abundance in the East Siberian Sea. 



Vize, after analyzing the ice abundance of the seas to the east of the Kolyma River and north 

 of Bering Strait from 1906 to 1924 comes to the conclusion that the periodicity of ice abundance of 

 4 to 5 years which has been observed by the Chuckchee is confirmed. He considers that it amounts 

 on the average to 4.6 years (figure 187), that is, almost exactly equal to the periodicity found 

 along the shores of Iceland. 



Figure 188 shows, according to Itin, the ice abundance in the Kara Sea and in the sea to the 

 east of the Kolyma River. Itin employed a 5-point classification system after analyzing the navi- 

 gability of these seas in various years. Despite the incompleteness of the data and the somewhat 

 unreliable evaluation of ice quantity in certain years, the law of "ice opposition" of the Kara and 



458 



