-The Technical Committee on Sea Ice Observations is a CliC-sponsored group
-Contributed by Jenny Hutchings
A sub-group of the Technical Committee on Sea Ice Observations held a CliC-sponsored working meeting in Hobart, Australia, September 5-9 2016 to discuss full coordination of Arctic and Antarctic ship bridge-based sea-ice observations. This resulted in completion of coordination efforts between the Antarctic ASPeCt and Arctic Ice Watch sea-ice observation programs. The participants succeeded in ensuring measurements were compatible between the two standards, and have implemented a plan to coordinate the Ice Watch observation recording software (ASSIST) with ASPeCt. This will ensure the two programs are fully compatible and any Antarctic observations recorded by ASSIST can be archived in the ASPeCt data base. Heil and Hutchings have jointly drafted a manual for bridge based research quality sea ice observations. This manual is much needed to ensure the standardization of observations in both hemispheres and to grow the program to non-expert observers.