EU Copernicus Imagery Confirms Glacier 2X The Size Of DC Just Broke Off Of Pine Island Glacier

[hatrack]

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An iceberg about twice the size of the District of Columbia broke off Pine Island Glacier in West Antarctica sometime between Feb. 8 and 9, satellite data shows, confirming yet another in a series of increasingly frequent calving events in this rapidly warming region.

The Pine Island Glacier is one of the fastest-retreating glaciers in Antarctica, and along with the Thwaites Glacier nearby, it’s a subject of close scientific monitoring to determine whether these glaciers are in a phase of runaway melting, potentially freeing up vast inland areas of ice to flow to the sea and raising sea levels. According to NASA, the region surrounding the Thwaites and Pine Island glaciers contains enough “highly vulnerable ice” to raise global sea levels by about 4 feet.

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“There have been 6 previous calvings from the Pine Island Glacier since 2000 and the time intervals between them have been getting smaller,” said Adrian Luckman, a geographer at Swansea University who closely follows this glacier, via email. "These events themselves are part of the normal behavior of large glaciers with floating sections so, whilst spectacular, this event is not significant in its own right. However, we know that, like Thwaites, the glacier has been thinning, and its shear margins have been getting weaker, all as a result of warmer ocean waters eroding the ice,” Luckman said. As was recently confirmed at Thwaites, the Pine Island Glacier is losing mass due to a combination of factors. First, calving events, such as the one over the weekend, can suddenly move the front of the ice shelf closer to the point where the ice meets the ground below, which is a boundary known as the grounding line. In addition, the ice shelf is melting from below as relatively warm waters eat away at the underside of the ice.

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“The concern with Pine Island Glacier is similar to that of Thwaites,” Luckman said. “Both glaciers are sitting on bedrock way below sea level and this deep topography extends far inland. This make them very sensitive [to] thinning at their seaward end caused by melt from the incursion of warm ocean waters. The increased frequency of calving at Pine Island Glacier is evidence that it is responding rapidly to the warming ocean.”

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https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2020/02/10/iceberg-thats-twice-size-washington-cleaves-off-pine-island-glacier-antarctica-sign-warming/

[Iliyah]

1. How can we reverse this?

The world would have to come together and scientist need to work together, bus alas, the global warming deniers are the rich and powerful.

Vote the Republicans out, then maybe we can again try with the rest of the world to reverse it.