A chilly Arctic summer has left 533,000 more square miles of ocean covered with ice than at the same time last year - an increase of 29 per cent. (snip) ...days before the annual autumn re-freeze is due to begin, an unbroken ice sheet more than half the size of Europe already stretches from the Canadian islands to Russia's northern shores. The Northwest Passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific has remained blocked by pack-ice all year. More than 20 yachts that had planned to sail it have been left ice-bound and a cruise ship attempting the route was forced...
