Mount Everest is widely known as the tallest mountain in the world. In the past three decades, the Great Himalayan peak has lost ice that took around 2,000 years to form, according to a new study.
Research indicates human-induced climate change caused ice loss of the South Col Glacier, the largest of Mount Everest’s glaciers.
“Our simulations also highlight mechanisms that may be of much broader significance for glacier retreat across the Himalaya,” mountain rage in Asia, said the study, published in Nature Portfolio Journal Climate and Atmospheric Science.
According to CNN, the findings indicate rapid glacier loss could contribute to climate impacts such as more frequent avalanches and a drying-up of water sources that around 1.6 billion people in mountain ranges depend on for drinking, irrigation and hydropower.
A team of scientists and climbers visited the glacier in 2019 to collect samples from a 32-ft. ice core. Additionally, they installed the world’s two highest automatic weather stations to collect data.
This expedition set three Guinness World Records: The highest altitude ice core taken at 8,020 meters, the highest altitude microplastic found on land, which were likely from clothing or tents, found at 8,440 meters; and the highest altitude weather station on land. The station was installed at “Balcony,” a ridge located 8,430 meters above sea level.
Dangerous hiking conditions at that altitude earned the area the nickname “death zone” and low oxygen levels make it difficult for life to exist there for more than short periods of time.
Paul Mayewski, the expedition leader and the director of the Climate Change Institute at the University of Maine, said climate change has been significantly impacting glaciers since the late 1990s. This extends even to the Earth’s highest peaks.
“It’s a complete change from what has been experienced in that area, throughout probably all of the period of occupation by humans in the mountains,” Mayewski told CNN regarding Mount Everest. “And it’s happened very fast.”
Researchers found that while the glacier once consisted of snowpack, or a mix of snow and ice. Now, it is mostly ice, a change that may have started in the 1950s.
“This transformation to ice means the glacier can no longer reflect radiation from the sun, making its melt more rapid,” said CNN. When ice is exposed to solar radiation, vaporization can speed up by a factor of 20.
Apart from its impact on dangerous avalanches and water resources, climate change could also make expeditions to Mount Everest more difficult.
For instance, glacier melt is expected to destabilize the Khumbu base camp, which is home to 1,000 climbers and logistics teams during the climbing season.
Snow and ice are expected to thin even further in the coming decades.
“Our study points to the critical balance afforded by snow-covered surfaces and the potential for loss throughout high mountain glacier systems as snow cover is depleted by changes in sublimation and surface melt driven by climate trends,” said researchers. “Everest’s highest glacier has served as a sentinel for this delicate balance and has demonstrated that even the roof of the Earth is impacted by anthropogenic source warming.”
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