Category Archives: Glaciers

Icelandic memorial warns future: ‘Only you know if we saved glaciers’

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Plaque marking Okjökull, the first glacier lost to climate crisis, to be unveiled in August

The first of Iceland’s 400 glaciers to be lost to the climate crisis will be remembered with a memorial plaque – and a sombre warning for the future – to be unveiled by scientists and local people next month.

The former Okjökull glacier, which a century ago covered 15 sq km (5.8 sq miles) of mountainside in western Iceland and measured 50 metres thick, has shrunk to barely 1 sq km of ice less than 15 metres deep and lost its status as a glacier.

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Glacial melting in Antarctica may become irreversible

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Thwaites glacier is likely to thaw and trigger 50cm sea level rise, US study suggests

Antarctica faces a tipping point where glacial melting will accelerate and become irreversible even if global heating eases, research suggests.

A Nasa-funded study found instability in the Thwaites glacier meant there would probably come a point when it was impossible to stop it flowing into the sea and triggering a 50cm sea level rise. Other Antarctic glaciers were likely to be similarly unstable.

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Himalayan glacier melting doubled since 2000, spy satellites show

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Ice losses indicate ‘devastating’ future for region and 1 billion people who depend on it for water

The melting of Himalayan glaciers has doubled since the turn of the century, with more than a quarter of all ice lost over the last four decades, scientists have revealed. The accelerating losses indicate a “devastating” future for the region, upon which a billion people depend for regular water.

The scientists combined declassified US spy satellite images from the mid-1970s with modern satellite data to create the first detailed, four-decade record of ice along the 2,000km (1,200-mile) mountain chain.

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‘Extraordinary thinning’ of ice sheets revealed deep inside Antarctica

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New research shows affected areas are losing ice five times faster than in the 1990s, with more than 100m of thickness gone in some places

Ice losses are rapidly spreading deep into the interior of the Antarctic, new analysis of satellite data shows.

The warming of the Southern Ocean is resulting in glaciers sliding into the sea increasingly rapidly, with ice now being lost five times faster than in the 1990s. The West Antarctic ice sheet was stable in 1992 but up to a quarter of its expanse is now thinning. More than 100 metres of ice thickness has been lost in the worst-hit places.

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Two-thirds of glacier ice in the Alps ‘will melt by 2100’

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If emissions continue to rise at current rate, ice will have all but disappeared from Europe’s Alpine valleys by end of century

Two-thirds of the ice in the glaciers of the Alps is doomed to melt by the end of the century as climate change forces up temperatures, a study has found.

Half of the ice in the mountain chain’s 4,000 glaciers will be gone by 2050 due to global warming already baked in by past emissions, the research shows. After that, even if carbon emissions have plummeted to zero, two-thirds of the ice will still have melted by 2100.

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Cavity two-thirds the size of Manhattan discovered under Antarctic glacier

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Disintegration of rapidly melting Thwaites ice mass could threaten coastal communities worldwide

Scientists have discovered a giant cavity at the bottom of a disintegrating glacier in Antarctica, sparking concerns that the ice sheet is melting more rapidly than expected.

Researchers working as part of a Nasa-led study found the cavern, which they said was 300 metres tall and two-thirds the size of Manhattan, at the bottom of the massive Thwaites glacier.

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A third of Himalayan ice cap doomed, finds report

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Even radical climate change action won’t save glaciers, endangering 2 billion people

At least a third of the huge ice fields in Asia’s towering mountain chain are doomed to melt due to climate change, according to a landmark report, with serious consequences for almost 2 billion people.

Even if carbon emissions are dramatically and rapidly cut and succeed in limiting global warming to 1.5C, 36% of the glaciers along in the Hindu Kush and Himalaya range will have gone by 2100. If emissions are not cut, the loss soars to two-thirds, the report found.

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