It's big. It's cold. And it's melting into the world's oceans.
It's Zachariae Isstrom, the latest in a string of Greenland glaciers to undergo rapid change in our warming world. A new NASA-funded study published today in the journal Science finds that Zachariae Isstrom broke loose from a glaciologically stable position in 2012 and entered a phase of accelerated retreat. The consequences will be felt for decades to come.
The reason? Zachariae Isstrom is big. It drains ice from an area of 35,440 square miles (91,780 square kilometers). That's about 5 percent of the Greenland Ice Sheet. All by itself, it holds enough water to raise global sea level by more than 18 inches (46 centimeters) if it were to melt completely. And now it's on a crash diet, losing 5 billion tons of mass every year. All that ice is crumbling into the North Atlantic Ocean.
"North Greenland glaciers are changing rapidly," said lead author Jeremie Mouginot, an assistant researcher in the Department of Earth System Science at the University of California, Irvine. "The shape and dynamics of Zachariae Isstrom have changed dramatically over the last few years. The glacier is now breaking up and calving high volumes of icebergs into the ocean, which will result in rising sea levels for decades to come."
Related Stories
The Orange County Register reports on an ongoing survey of the sea floor around Greenland.
The authors of Bathymetry data reveal glaciers vulnerable to ice-ocean interaction in Uummannaq and Vaigat glacial fjords, west Greenland (DOI: 10.1002/2016GL067832) measured "seafloor depths 100–1000 m deeper than in existing charts." They explain that, near Greenland, salty 2.5°C water lies beneath 1°C water with a lesser concentration of salt. Hence glaciers in deep water are likely to melt more, due to contact with warm sea water, than those in shallow water.
Further information:
Oceans Melting Greenland portal
UC Irvine press release
UC Irvine Magazine essay
Related stories:
Scientists: Greenland Ice Sheet is Melting Freakishly Early
Greenland Was Once Ice Free
In Greenland, Another Major Glacier Comes Undone
Vegetarianism Reflected in the Genes
(Score: 3, Funny) by Gaaark on Wednesday November 18 2015, @02:04AM
here comes the next hollywood movie: SHARKBERG!!
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 3, Touché) by Bogsnoticus on Wednesday November 18 2015, @03:19AM
Not catchy enough.
SHARKBERGNADO, however, is something that sounds so horrifyingly bad, you'll invite all your mates around to watch, and even supply the popcorn.
Genius by birth. Evil by choice.
(Score: 3, Funny) by linkdude64 on Wednesday November 18 2015, @06:34AM
If there was ever a topic so grave that its severity should not be diffused with humor, it's global warming. I really wish I could find some way to laugh about this, I really do.
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Wednesday November 18 2015, @05:08PM
If there was ever a topic so grave that its severity should not be diffused with humor
Don't worry. There isn't.
(Score: 1) by PocketSizeSUn on Wednesday November 18 2015, @02:19AM
Beach front property goes on deep discount. Deal of a lifetime! Buy it before it goes away!
(Score: 3, Funny) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday November 18 2015, @12:00PM
The thing that makes me laugh and laugh is the thought of all those mansions in the Hamptons being underwater--literally. And the private islands the billionaires have been stocking up on to escape the coming revenge of the plebes.
Evil billionaire's private jet touches down on landing strip. Limousine whisks the monocle-sporting, ascot-wearing tycoon 50 yards to his sprawling island retreat...
"Jeeves, why are waves lapping at the foot of my Ottoman?"
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 1) by xav on Wednesday November 18 2015, @10:07PM
> Beach front property goes on deep discount. Deal of a lifetime! Buy it before it goes away!
But be prepared to spend twice the cost of that property into making it waterproof.
(Score: 0, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 18 2015, @03:28AM
Looks like we'll soon be able to go back to calling it 'global warming' instead of 'climate change'?
(Score: 2, Informative) by jmorris on Wednesday November 18 2015, @04:14AM
Little early to say what this winter brings but we know about the previous one. A minute of Google gets this:
20.01.2015 17:53 Age: 301 days
Ice is accumulating on Greenland at a faster rate than average, according to the latest data. This follows a dramatic slow down in the melt rate observed last summer and may be evidence of greater than expected variability in the Arctic climate system.
Greenland's ice sheet appears to be growing faster this winter than in recent years, according to new data from the Danish Meteorological Institute.
This increased rate of ice accumulation follows a virtual standstill in the loss of mass from the huge ice sheet last year that was reported by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) of the US.
Ice is currently accumulating at a faster rate than the average over the period from 1990 to 2011 and since the end of November it has been growing at its fastest rate in at least four years, according to the DMI data (see bottom panel of third graphic on the right). Ice accumulation is occurring over an area of the ice sheet that is significantly larger than the average area of accumulation for the period from 1990 to 2011, with particularly high accumulation rates in the south east.
Last month NOAA reported satellite data showing that the rate of ice loss from the Greenland Ice Sheet slowed significantly in 2014. NOAA's annual Arctic Report Card document published in December states that there was a “negligible” loss of ice mass amounting to just 6 billion tonnes from the Greenland Ice Sheet between June 2013 and June 2014.
Nobody has anything close to accurate record longer than a century, especially in places like the heart of Greenland's glaciers. Most of the numbers used today are indirect based on albedo and other error prone measurements.
But don't let Science get in the way of the daily devotional. Carry on.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 18 2015, @09:13AM
Citizen science at its finest... one minute search inside google's filter bubble. Then cherry pick the best-of parts you really really want to hear. Oh wow.
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Wednesday November 18 2015, @04:38PM
You mean like the corporate scientists that should be doing real science?
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 3, Informative) by DeathMonkey on Wednesday November 18 2015, @05:17PM
Oh yeah, cherry picking at it's finest!! Notice he doesn't include links. Because if he did you would notice these gems:
Last month NOAA reported satellite data showing that the rate of ice loss from the Greenland Ice Sheet slowed significantly in 2014.
The Greenland Ice Sheet normally accumulates ice during the northern hemisphere autumn and winter period and loses ice mass during the late spring and summer; for an ice sheet to be stable over time then the winter gains must balance the summer losses. However, in recent years more mass has been lost in the melt seasons than has been accumulated during the rest of the time meaning that the Greenland Ice Sheet has been shrinking.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 18 2015, @08:15AM
i assume the sea / ocean bottom will also "retreat" a bit with all that extra weight distributed evenly and thus will compress earths core a tiny bit more, hopefully leading to a stronger magnetic shield for earth inhabitants overall?
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Covalent on Wednesday November 18 2015, @10:58AM
Pompeii:
And the ice kept tumbling down
On the planet that we looooooooove
Great bergs crashed down from the north
Bringing flooding from abooooooove
But if you close your eyes
Does it almost seem like
Nothing's changed at all
And if you close you eyes
Does it almost feel like
You've been here before
And as a previous commenter so astutely put it, how AM I going to be an optimist about this?
If you're paying attention, you can't be.
If you're not, then I have some lovely real estate in Miami I'd love to sell you.
You can't rationally argue somebody out of a position they didn't rationally get into.
(Score: 4, Funny) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday November 18 2015, @12:01PM
I hear the Climate Change Deniers are looking to rent office space on the floor above the Flat Earth Society...
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2, Redundant) by Dunbal on Wednesday November 18 2015, @12:58PM
Everyone panic, it's not like they've been doing this since the last ice age.
(Score: 4, Funny) by GreatAuntAnesthesia on Wednesday November 18 2015, @04:57PM
"Hey, we've discovered a bug in the ECU of a particular range of cars that means that the brakes will stop working when you need them most."
Dunbal's response: "Don't panic, cars have always had brakes."
"Oh no, that plane full of orphans and puppies and orphaned puppies just crashed into a hand-grenade factory."
Dunbal's response: "Don't panic, planes have been taking off, flying and then coming back down to earth for over a century."
"Highly infectious drug-resistant airborne super-ebola has been detected at major airports all over the world"
Dunbal's response: "Don't panic, ebola's not new."
"Oh my god, someone just injected an entire herd of enraged african elephants with LSD and set them loose in a crowded sports stadium"
Dunbal's response: "Don't panic, pachyderms have been around for at least as long as humans."
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Wednesday November 18 2015, @05:11PM
We didn't have millions of people living within 18 inches of the high tide last time this happened.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 18 2015, @07:13PM
Perhaps we should fix that, as there are many more reasons beyond possible ocean rise for why living that close to high tide is a bad idea.