Geophys. Res. Lett. doi:10.1029/2009GL039810 (2009)

Arctic residents have complained that their weather is changing, and a study by researchers in Australia backs this up.

Ian Simmonds and Kevin Keay of the University of Melbourne examined the relationship between the number and strength of cyclones each year in the Arctic basin and the extent of Arctic sea ice during the month of September for the past 30 years. They found that years with the least amount of ice had significantly stronger storms, although there was no correlation with the number of storms.

The findings support previous forecasts that the decline in sea ice, and particularly the record lows of recent years, is raising the risk of stronger storms in the Arctic.