Antarctica’s 120 km wide Thwaites Glacier also, known as the “Doomsday Glacier “, is melting fast over the years.
- Being a size of 1.9 lakh square km, it contains enough water to raise the world sea level by more than half a metre.
- Studies have found the amount of ice flowing out of it has nearly doubled over the past 30 years.
- Satellite images reveal it has been retreating at an alarming rate of somewhere between 0.6 to 0.8 kilometers per year on average since 2001, prompting some to dub it the “doomsday glacier.”
- Now, researchers at Sweden’s University of Gothenburg are saying that fears related to Thwaites’s melting are worse than previously thought, owing to the supply of warm water flowing underneath at a rate underestimated in the past.
- Based on its chemical makeup, some of the warm water came from neighboring Pine Island Bay. Hence scientists suggest, that what happens in Pine Island Bay doesn’t necessarily stay in Pine Island Bay — and that the fate of Thwaites may be closely intertwined with that of the Pine Island Glacier.
(References: 1. https://www.sciencenews.org/article/climate-thwaites-glacier-under-ice-shelf-risks-warm-water and 2. Indian Express)
