Antarctic scientists from the UK have found more than 65,000 pools of melting ice on the edge of East Antarctic Ice Sheet. The dire discovery led by Durham University highlights the region’s vulnerability to global warming. Meltwater is the release of water from ice or snow on ice sheets and glaciers that is being more frequently associated with globally rising temperatures. An Antarctic satellite survey of 1.9 million square miles of ice (five million kilometres) found meltwater in regions previously through less affected.
Researchers have now claimed the number of meltwater lakes has exceeded all expectations and presented their findings in the journal Scientific Reports.
Lead author Professor Chris Stokes said: “We’ve known for some time that lakes are forming in East Antarctica but we were surprised at quite how many formed and all around the ice sheet margin.
“The density of the lakes in some regions is similar to the densities we’ve observed on the Greenland Ice Sheet and on the Antarctic Peninsula, which are generally viewed as much warmer.
“It’s concerning because we know that in other areas large numbers of lakes draining can fracture apart floating ice shelves, causing the inland ice to speed-up.”
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The researchers noted, however, the 65,000 lakes figure is a minimum estimate as some may have been smaller or grown in size since the survey.
The Antarctic researchers carried out a satellite survey of the icy continent in January 2017, during the ice sheet’s summer met season.
The satellite images found concentrations of melting ice near the ice sheet’s coastal borders.
Many of the lakes were found to be the size of a swimming pool but the largest exceeded 27 square miles in size (70 square km).
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In many cases, the water was found on parts of the ice sheet already starting to float on the sea.
Some lakes were found hundreds of miles inland and up to an elevation of 3,280ft (1,000m).
About 60 percent of the melted ice forms on floating ice shelves, including some the researchers said are at risk of collapse.
If the meltwater lakes grow in size, they risk becoming big enough to fracture the ice and escape into the sea.
Professor Stokes said there is no “imminent threat to the stability of the ice sheet” but the study has shown which parts of the ice shelf need to be monitored in the future.
Antarctica is naturally cold throughout the year with temperatures dropping as low -40F degrees (-40C) in the winter.
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In the summer, however, temperatures can dip above freezing, which causes surface ice to melt away.
Climate change caused by global warming is understood to accelerate the process.
Dr Amber Leeson from Lancaster University, who co-authored the study, said: “At the opposite end of the Earth, we’ve seen Greenland’s population of supraglacial lakes spread inland as air temperatures have risen, and we’re concerned about the potential implications for enhanced melting and ice loss there.
“Until recently we assumed that East Antarctica was too cold to be similarly vulnerable but this work shows that there may be closer parallels here to our observations on Greenland than previously thought.”
Co-author Dr Stewart Jamieson from Durham University added: “At a time where the pressure to act on climate change is increasing, it’s more important than ever to establish baseline measurements against which future change can be compared – this study will enable just that in relation to surface melting at the edge of the world’s largest ice sheet
