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A Hole Opens Up Under Antarctic Glacier -- Big Enough To Fit Two-Thirds of Manhattan (nbcnews.com)
Scientists have discovered an enormous void under an Antarctic glacier, sparking concern that the ice sheet is melting faster than anyone had realized -- and spotlighting the dire threat posed by rising seas to coastal cities around the world, including New York City and Miami. From a report: The cavity under Thwaites Glacier in West Antarctica is about six miles long and 1,000 feet deep -- representing the loss of 14 billion tons of ice. It was discovered after an analysis of data collected by Italian and German satellites, as well as NASA's Operation IceBridge, a program in which aircraft equipped with ice-penetrating radar fly over polar regions to study the terrain. The discovery is described in a paper published Jan. 30 in the journal Science Advances. The researchers expected to see significant loss of ice, but the scale of the void came as a shock.
So much for my Fortress of Solitude.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Wasn't this the proposed theme to Iron Sky 2. Hint: It's Lizard people living down there below Antarctica.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
How many football fields is two thirds of a Manhattan?
No, puny human, the entire ice shelf is thousands of time larger than the hole that was discovered.
However, the undermining of the ice shelf has advanced more than expected and portends the entire ice shelf, as well as the glaciers behind it melting out to sea.
I'm asking a serious question here, help me understand how this is possible...
The melting is at the BOTTOM of the glacier, where the effects of climate change are at the absolute lowest, being isolated from the air above by many feet of ice, snow and other stuff. Plus, the ice that's now melted was frozen and buried centuries ago. Plus, this is now a void, so one presumes that the conductive water flowing between the rocks below and the ice above is gone.
How is this due to global warming?
Seems to me that this void would be from the earth below is warmer at this spot than in others... But that's geothermal changes, not climate change. Is that wrong? If so, how do we know what caused this?
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
You are willfully ignorant, and it is clear you never even read the article.
In the article, they explain that the retreat of the glacier and the sinking of the surface are explained by the interior melting. The landscape is changing, and it stands to reason that something is causing these changes. Thanks to ground penetrating radar, we know what.
If you believe the void within the glacier was there the entire time, then you have to explain why the glacier is only retreating now and why the surface has just started sinking. So, I guess I'll be waiting for your publication.
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According to the latest ruleset, this post should be modded as Vorpal Flamebait +5.
As an ice age species, we have a vested interest in not accelerating the rate of change. Absolutely the glaciers are going to melt. We need to adapt, but we need to buy time too. The changes at play are much bigger than you're imagining.
Do these morons think that if humans had never graced the face of the Earth that these glaciers would never ever melt for all of time?
The glaciers are going to melt, because their existence is cyclical, as the very same climate "scientists" will tell you. There are well-established periods of glaciation followed by well-established periods of pole-to-pole tropics.
THE GLACIERS ARE GOING TO MELT WITH OR WITHOUT HUMAN ACTIVITY.
This means that human contributions to climate are COMPLETELY FUCKING IMMATERIAL.
We should be focusing our energy on adaptation rather than obstinate refusal to go along with mother nature. We could spend the sum total of human wealth on trying to stop it, only to buy ourselves maybe a couple hundred years, or we can just adapt.
Say what? Human contribution is, of course, completely material.
If you put an ice cube on the kitchen counter, it will melt. If you take a flame to it, it will melt much faster. But according to you, the flame is immaterial. Besides, the glaciers formed naturally many years ago. So assuming they will melt regardless does not really make sense. I'd advise you to work on your own reasoning skills before calling people morons.
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
"representing the loss of 14 billion tons of ice."
So they KNOW for a fact that ice has always been there? Or are we just assuming it was there because we did not find this until now? There are a lot of assumptions going on here... and because of the "Cult of Global Warming" it is now impossible have have responsible discussion.
Was the ice there before? Why is that information not being provided? Oh wait... I get it... just like people of faith are required to accept the existence of their Gods, the GW Cult expects all the deniers to take what they think on faith too!
Science these days is starting to require more faith than many religions.
This post is unintentionally hilarious. It is indeed impossible to have a responsible discussion, when one side of it doesn't even bother to know the facts. If you had read the article you would know that the researchers have been watching the area for years and have recorded an increase in the size of the void. How can you expect to be taken seriously when you can't be bothered to do some basic research?
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
...if only it WOULD take 2/3 of Manhattan.
Can we order up one about Washington DC sized?
If this is the outcome of warming, I'm not going to really be upset?
-Styopa
Well, problem is now the Stargate is accessible from off-world again.
#DeleteChrome
When the scientific establishment calls for relocation policies that encourage colonization of "flyover country" in the US by the coastal population.
I'm perfectly willing to accept the possibility that "global warming" is happening, but until the discussion is "it's happening, but why" and all "whys" are entertained including "we have no control, move in with the Hillbillies if you don't want to drown" I'm not going to give much credence to the fearmongering because skin in the game determines the degree of commitment one has.
Really? Do you not steer your car until the last possible second before impact?
Wouldn't it be nice to do something about the issue before we have to undergo mass migrations? If you are so willing to accept the possibility that AGW is real, and since you do have skin in the game by virtue of living on this planet, why not look into it rather than dismissing warnings a "fear mongering"? Why wouldn't you consider calls for mass relocation "fear mongering"?
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
I understand it's hard to grasp the scale of what we're talking about here. Just to give you a sense, the glacier in question has an area of 166,500 km^2 or roughly the same size as the country of Tunisia, and is about 300 meters thick. The area covered by Manhattan is only about 3/100 of 1% of that.
The volume of missing ice represents probably less than 1/500th of the ice in the glacier. It's not the volume lost already that's the concern, it's what the void says about the vastly larger volume of ice in that glacier. Internal melting means that there is some kind of water flow occurring, which could destabilize the entire glacier. That's over 45 gigatons of ice, enough to raise global sea level by over 1/10 of a cm.
Of course that's not very much. If this is the *only* land-based ice sheet or glacier that were unstable, it's not a sea level rise issue; it's equivalent to about one year's contribution of ocean thermal expansion to sea level rise.
This is kind of like finding a crack in an individual Airbus A380 wing; it's not very big compared to the wing's 420 m^2 area, and this is just one wing on one out of hundreds of A380 in service. That doesn't make it a small deal.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Because the ice is a heat sink. Melting ice needs a massive amount of energy. Once its gone, temperatures will rise sharply.
Maybe you'll find answers in the paper. Did you try reading it ?