The image at right is a repeating animation of the sea ice surrounding the continent over the course of one year, September 2006 to August 2007. Note the following:
- The ice is at its minimum in February, at the end of the austral summer.
- Any area that is not completely white is not 100% solid ice, but is rather composed of a congestion of icebergs and ice slabs. Even in the middle of the austral winter, the vast majority of the sea ice is not 100% solid ice.
- At McMurdo we use the term "sea ice" to describe 100% solid ice that is locked in place because it is frozen to the shoreline. The actual term for such ice is "fast ice". In the image at right, any solid white areas immediately adjacent to the continent perimeter is probably fast ice.
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