The warnings of melting sea ice and glaciers have been coming for years. New reports show how 10 glaciers on Svalbard have melted so much that they’ve retracted back to land just in the past two years.
The report, from the Norwegian Polar Institute, comes shortly after news that an entire new island in the Norwegian-controlled archipelago had emerged from under the melting ice. Now the Austfonna glacier involved, Norway’s largest, is shown to be melting at record speed.
“What’s special with this year’s measurements is that there’s been a gigantic retraction of all the glaciers that extend out to sea, and much greater than those up on land,” researcher Geir Moholdt told Norwegian Broadcasting (NRK). He’s been monitoring glaciers on Svalbard for the past 20 years.
Much of the melting is blamed on warmer seas. Around 200 of the glaciers on Svalbard have extended from land into the Arctic waters, and can now lose dozens of meters every day, Moholdt said.
NewsinEnglish.no staff
