Chilling discovery in Antarctica that has scientists sounding alarm bells
An Antarctic glacier shrunk by nearly 50 per cent in just two months to mark the fastest retreat recorded in modern history - and the way it happened could have big implications for global sea level rise.
The Hektoria Glacier, slightly larger in size than the NSW city of Newcastle, is on the Antarctic Peninsula, a spindly chain of mountains sticking off the continent like a thumb pointing toward South America. It is one of the fastest warming regions on the planet.
Grounded glaciers such as Hektoria, which rest on the seabed and don't float, generally retreat no more than a few hundred metres a year. But between November and December 2022, Hektoria retreated by 8 kilometres, according to a study published in the journal Nature Geoscience.
Between 2022 and 2023, broken ...