BERLIN: Ice shelves in the Amundsen Basin area of Antarctica have been destabilised by warming seawater, a shift that may accelerate melting of the west antarctic ice sheet and drive up sea levels, according to a new study.
if the shelves protecting the continental ice sheet melt, it will trigger an "unstoppable" process and the "huge west antarctic ice sheet would collapse completely ", scientists at the potsdam institute for climate impact research said in a recent paper in the proceedings of the national academy of science. "in our simulations, 60 years of melting at the presently observed rate are enough to launch a process which is then unstoppable and goes on for thousands of years," johannes feldmann, the lead author, said.
"what we call the eternal ice of antarctica unfortunately turns out not to be eternal at all this would eventually yield at least 3m of sea-level rise," he said. "this certainly is a long process. but it's likely starting right now."
the tongue of glacial ice in the Amundsen basin is only 1% of the area of the western icecap, but it acts "like a plug", anders leverson, a co-author, said. "if [it] disappears, a vicious cycle of retreating continental ice would kick in depleting the icecap of the western antarctic." bloomberg