Melting Glaciers Signal Warming
Rising Temperatures Evidenced as Ice Recedes
Melting glaciers around the world provide proof of global warming.
Some signs are impossible to ignore, and at Glacier National Park these signs abound.
Here, the evidence of warming temperatures is clear as year after year the glaciers that give the park its name slowly melt away. Since 1850 the number of glaciers affected by global warming has spiked, causing scientists to predict that by 2030 there may be no glaciers left. According to Park officials, there were 150 glaciers in 1850. Today, approximately 35 remain.
Unfortunately, the trend at Glacier National Park is not unique. Across the globe, scientists studying glacial change are seeing similar results. In Antarctica, where temperatures have risen approximately 5 degrees Celsius, ice cliffs and shelves are disintegrating at a rapid pace. This change to the environment creates an unstable atmosphere for inhabitants by reducing the growth of krill, a shrimp-like staple for Adelies penguins whose population is declining, and by creating unfavorable nesting conditions necessary to sustain life.
In Alaska, permafrost temperatures have risen between .5 to 1.5 degrees since 1980, causing roads and buildings to sink, riverbanks to erode and high levels of methane to be released from the thawed peat. A powerful greenhouse gas, the methane could worsen the situation by adding to the atmospheric warming. Alaska’s glaciers are melting at twice the rate previously thought after a 2002 study revealed severe loss of glacial ice.
Elsewhere, glaciers are receding at a dramatic pace. In the Alps, the Rhone glacier has almost vanished from sight, with similar happenings with the glacier Ururashraju in Peru. And in Austria, their longest glacier, the Pasterze, is losing 15 meters per year, its run-off creating an artificial lake called the Margaritzen-Strausee. And, according to NASA, the polar ice caps are melting at a rate of nine percent per decade, with ice thickness in the artic dropping by 40 percent since the 1960’s.
The consequences of melting glaciers and ice caps can be devastating. Rising sea levels leads to the loss of coastal lands, islands, and communities. Flooding can wipe out entire regions, especially those in low-lying areas around the Gulf of Mexico and the Chesapeake Bay.
The loss of glaciers and sea ice are just part of the damage that global warming can and is causing. If conditions continue at this same pace, our planet will be a very different one than we have ever known. Sickness, drought, flooding, hunger—all these consequences await us if changes are not made soon.
Global warming is no longer a theory. It is a threat to all of us.
