Antarctic Glacier Saw the Fastest Retreat In Modern History

An anonymous reader quotes a report from CNN: An Antarctic glacier shrunk by nearly 50% in just two months, the fastest retreat recorded in modern history, according to a new study -- and the way it retreated could have big implications for global sea level rise. The Hektoria Glacier, roughly the size of Philadelphia, is on the Antarctic Peninsula, a spindly chain of mountains sticking off the continent like a thumb pointing toward South America. It is one of the fastest warming regions on Earth.

Grounded glaciers like Hektoria, which rest on the seabed and don't float, generally retreat no more than a few hundred meters a year. But between November and December 2022, Hektoria retreated by 5 miles, according to the study published Monday in the journal Nature Geoscience. Understanding more about why this happened is vital; if larger glaciers retreat at similar rates, it could have 'catastrophic implications for sea level rise,' the authors wrote in a statement accompanying the report. Antarctica holds enough ice to raise global sea level by around 190 feet. Models show that the latest time this kind of ice plain melting occurred was between about 15,000 and 19,000 years ago, 'during a period of warming that ended the last Ice Age,' notes the report.

'[W]e hadn't seen it play out live before, certainly not at this rate,' said Naomi Ochwat, a study co-author and postdoctoral associate at the University of Colorado Boulder.

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