Due to the massive ice loss in the polar regions, the mass shifts on the Earth’s surface are so great that the Earth’s rotation is slowing down. Photo: Julia Hager The redistribution of mass due to melting ice sheets, ice shelves and glaciers has an...
Greenland is dotted with frozen meltwater lakes such as the one above, photographed during a NASA expedition in 2012. Photo: NASA Operation IceBridge Surface ice in Greenland has been melting at an increasing rate in recent decades, while the trend in Antarctica has...
Sea ice in the Arctic would be disappearing even faster had it not been for efforts to stop the ozone layer from being depleted (Photo: Julia Hager) The Montreal Protocol was adopted in 1987 in order to protect the ozone layer. An unpredicted side effect of its strict...
In particular, the Thwaites and Pine Island glaciers in West Antarctica are losing mass extremely rapidly carrying large amounts of meltwater into the Southern Ocean. Photo: David Vaughan, BAS Deep-sea currents around Antarctica could slow by 42 percent over the next...
Since the late 1990s, the baseline of Thwaites Glacier has retreated inland by 14 kilometers. Much of the ice sheet is below sea level, making it vulnerable to rapid, irreversible ice loss. Global sea levels could then rise by more than half a meter within centuries....