http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/
Since the March Equinox, almost 2,500,000 square km of Arctic sea ice has disappeared as the Arctic Ocean turns to face the central Sun as a function of the orbital behavior of the Earth.
Like frost melting as the Earth turns to the Sun during its daily cycle, the Arctic event is spectacular in volume and in effect as the North pole along with the rest of the planet turns separately in a circle and parallel with the orbital plane.
Mathematicians like the saying that there is 'nothing North of the North pole' but this isn't true as the Northern latitude, in relative terms, is 23 1/2 degrees below the fully illuminated face gauged by the orbital plane. In this respect the North pole is a window into the surface rotation to the central Sun accomplished by all places on Earth over the course of an annual orbit.