Anthony noted an error on the NOAA web site, where they claimed that Arctic ice extent was second lowest on record.
On further examination, I noticed another serious problem.
The text says “22% below normal,” but the map looks like almost 50% below the red normal line. So I did some pixel counting.
The map shows that the ice is 46% below normal, not 22%. The projection is not perfect, so the measurement is not precise – but the discrepancy between 22% and 46% is much too large to be accounted for by distortion.
The NSIDC equivalent map below shows more reasonable numbers, at 29% below normal.
The blink comparator below shows the differences between the NSIDC map and the NOAA map.
As you can see, the NOAA map makes the condition of the ice look worse than it is. They show large non-existent areas of missing ice near the pole. Below is a satellite image showing what the ice really looked like around the pole yesterday.
Looks to me like NOAA has some problems.