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Satellites monitoring the state of the White Continent indicate some 200 billion tonnes a year are now being lost to the ocean as a result of melting.
This is pushing up global sea levels by 0.6mm annually - a three-fold increase since 2012 when the last such assessment was undertaken.
Scientists report the new numbers in the journal Nature.
Governments will need to take account of the information and its accelerating trend as they plan future defences to protect low-lying coastal communities.
The researchers say the losses are occurring predominantly in the West of the continent, where warm waters are getting under and melting the fronts of glaciers that terminate in the ocean.
https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-44470208
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-018-0179-y
See also: Ars Technica, Phys Org and University of Leeds.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by DeathMonkey on Thursday June 14 2018, @08:41PM (2 children)
From your link:
“We’re essentially in agreement with other studies that show an increase in ice discharge in the Antarctic Peninsula and the Thwaites and Pine Island region of West Antarctica,” said Jay Zwally, a glaciologist with NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, and lead author of the study, which was published on Oct. 30 in the Journal of Glaciology. “Our main disagreement is for East Antarctica and the interior of West Antarctica – there, we see an ice gain that exceeds the losses in the other areas.” Zwally added that his team “measured small height changes over large areas, as well as the large changes observed over smaller areas.”
Those cherries you just picked look delicious!
(Score: 3, Funny) by realDonaldTrump on Thursday June 14 2018, @11:43PM (1 child)
The ice caps were going to melt, they were going to be gone by now, but now they’re setting records. They’re at a record level.
They say Antarctica is a cold dessert. And it's like a dessert. You go to a very nice restaurant, you order a sundae, right? But it's very small, so you ask for extra ice cream. For 2 or 3 more scoops of ice cream. And they give you extra ice cream. Same bowl, more ice cream. Big beautiful sundae -- possibly the biggest they ever made. But if they're not too careful, maybe some the ice cream gets out of the bowl, maybe it drips over the side of the bowl. Where the way they serve it to everyone else, no drips. Because those people got less ice cream. But you're getting more, it can get very messy.
Antarctica, same thing. I mean, look at Antarctica, it's totally covered in ice, right? Almost totally covered. They get more ice, where's it going to go? On top of the ice they have already. It has to, there's nowhere else. Much deeper ice and there's more coming off at the edges. Because there's a lot more ice in the middle!!!!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 17 2018, @05:32AM
Mr. President, you explain things in a way I can understand them. Thank you sir.