Mount Everest: Carbon dating shows the top layer of ice is 2,000 years old, study says. (Represent)
Kathmandu:
A new study has shown that the ice on glaciers near Mount Everest that took millennia to form has shrunk dramatically over the past three decades due to climate change.
The Southern Col Formation may have lost about 55 meters (180 feet) of thickness over the past 25 years, according to research led by the University of Maine and published this week in the journal Nature.
Carbon dating shows that the top layer of ice is about 2,000 years old, suggesting that the glacier is thinning 80 times faster than it was when it formed, the study said.
At that rate, the South Col “will probably be gone in a few decades,” lead scientist Paul Mayewski told National Geographic.
“It’s a pretty remarkable transformation,” he added.
The South Col Glacier is about 7,900 meters (26,000 feet) above sea level and a kilometer below the summit of the world’s tallest mountain.
Other researchers have shown that Himalayan glaciers are melting at an increasingly rapid rate.
As glaciers shrink, hundreds of lakes that have formed in the Himalayan foothills can break apart and cause flooding.
Nepalese mountaineer Kami Rita Sherpa, who has climbed Everest a record 25 times since 1994, told AFP news agency on Saturday that he had witnessed first-hand the changes at the summit.
“Now we are seeing rocks exposed in areas that used to have snow. Not only on Everest, other mountains are also losing snow and ice,” Mr. Sherpa told AFP. That’s worrisome.
Himalayan glaciers are an important source of water for the nearly two billion people who live around the mountains and river valleys below.
They feed the 10 most important river systems in the world and also help provide food and energy for billions of people.
The water-related impacts of climate change are experienced daily by millions of people worldwide, according to UN climate scientists.
(Except for the title, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from an aggregated feed.)
