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Ice Melting

Scientists have found evidence that between 9,000 and 5,000 years ago, in a period termed mid-Holocene, the East Antarctic ice sheet in Queen Maud Land melted rapidly during the time when the world experienced warmer-than-present summers. They said that this ice sheet sector in East Antarctica was thinner following the end of the last ice age, when massive ice sheets previously covered North America, northern Europe and southern South America. When these ice sheets melted, they raised the sea level by more than 100 metres. For context, if absolutely all of Antarctica's present day ice melted, the seas would rise by 58 metres on average. Sixty per cent of the world's fresh water is bound up in Antarctic ice sheets. "The ice sheet in East Antarctica stores enormous amounts of water. This means that this is the biggest possible source of future sea level rise - up to 53 metres if all of the East Antarctic ice melts - and is seen as the largest source of uncertainties in the future sea

Updated On: 05 Apr 2023 | 8:20 PM IST

Widespread cracks and crevasses were revealed in observations beneath the floating shelf of the vulnerable Thwaites Glacier of the Antarctic, where melting occurs more rapidly, contributing to its retreat and potentially to sea-level rise, according to a new study. The first-of-their-kind observations of the Florida-sized glacier was obtained by deploying the remotely operated Icefin underwater robot through a nearly 2,000-foot-deep borehole drilled in the ice, the study said. The research team from Cornell University, US, and international collaborators, captured the first close-up views of the critical point near the grounding line where Thwaites Glacier in western Antarctica - one of the continent's fastest changing and most unstable glaciers - meets the Amundsen Sea, the study said. From that area, the researchers concluded that Thwaites has retreated smoothly and steadily up the ocean floor since at least 2011. They found that flat sections covering much of the ice shelf's bas

Updated On: 16 Feb 2023 | 3:52 PM IST

With estimated thinning rates of nearly two metre per year, glaciers on the Mount Everest such as South Col Glacier, has been thinning at an alarming rate

Updated On: 08 Feb 2022 | 7:58 PM IST

Spawning streams are overheating and droughts are drying up salmon habitats entirely, impacting many food webs from the Rocky Mountains and Coast Ranges to the Pacific Ocean.

Updated On: 14 Dec 2021 | 11:55 AM IST

Global warming due to carbon emissions is a key factor

Updated On: 25 Jan 2021 | 5:04 PM IST

Sensors on the drone would assess sunlight reflected from the ice

Updated On: 29 Oct 2020 | 2:13 AM IST

The pandemic has muted the U.N. meeting, with world leaders speaking not from the podium in New York but via video from home

Updated On: 28 Sep 2020 | 1:54 AM IST

The study will involve multiple cruises to the whales' feeding grounds in the Southern Ocean off Antarctica and the coastlines of the three continents where they breed

Updated On: 23 Sep 2020 | 8:02 AM IST

1.7 billion people to face severe water shortage due to the decline in glacier runoffs in Central Europe and Tibetan Plateau between 2030 and 2050

Updated On: 10 Sep 2020 | 12:50 PM IST

There are 2028 glacial lakes and water bodies in the Himalayan region catchment which contribute to rivers flowing across India

Updated On: 03 Sep 2020 | 1:25 PM IST

The polar region is warming at two to three times the global average, impacting nature and humanity at a global scale

Updated On: 29 Aug 2020 | 12:14 PM IST

The previous record was set in 2012 when the island lost 464 billion tons of mass from its thick ice sheet

Updated On: 26 Aug 2020 | 12:10 PM IST

The enhanced warming is likely to further accelerate the snow and glacier melt over this region, with a consequent increase in flooding

Updated On: 05 Jun 2020 | 6:53 PM IST

The mission will be set up under National Action Plan for Climate Change and will include measures on climate change-related adaptation and mitigation while simultaneously advancing development

Updated On: 29 Nov 2019 | 11:00 PM IST

The study, published in the journal Scientific Reports, found that aerosols from biomass burning, such as black carbon, can be transported by wind to tropical Andean glaciers

Updated On: 29 Nov 2019 | 4:04 PM IST

According to the researchers, nearly 250 million people around the world currently live on land that may go below water levels during annual floods

Updated On: 31 Oct 2019 | 2:48 AM IST

Signs of planet's changing climate, this explains severe weather change in mid-latitude countries

Updated On: 14 Apr 2017 | 9:27 AM IST