Latest news with #glaciermonitoring
Malay Mail
05-07-2025
- Climate
- Malay Mail
Swiss glaciers face ‘alarming' early melt as tipping point arrives in July
GENEVA, July 5 — The snow and ice accumulated last winter by Switzerland's glaciers has already melted away, a monitoring service said, with Friday marking the alarming second-earliest arrival on record of the tipping point known as glacier loss day. All further melting between now and October will see the size of glaciers in the Swiss Alps shrink, according to Glacier Monitoring in Switzerland (GLAMOS). This century, the tipping point, on average, has been reached in mid-August—itself already bad news for the nation's 1,400 glaciers, which are shrinking at a staggering rate. Its arrival several weeks earlier on July 4 is 'another alarm call', GLAMOS chief Matthias Huss told AFP. 'It's like the glaciers are shouting out: 'We're disappearing. Help us.'' Glaciers in the Swiss Alps began to retreat about 170 years ago. The retreat was initially modest but in recent decades, melting has accelerated significantly as the climate warms. The volume of Swiss glaciers shrank by 38 percent between 2000 and 2024. Summer of destruction 'If we have a glacier loss day, it means that the glacier is losing mass,' said Huss. 'For a glacier that is healthy, the day would occur at the end of September, or in October—or not at all'. With no glacier loss day, the summer would simply melt away only the snow that accumulated over the previous winter. This would be 'the ideal case—a glacier in equilibrium with the climate', said Huss. Its arrival on July 4 means that 'critically, we have the whole summer left to destroy the ice'. 'Moving this day forward by five to six weeks before the normal date over the last 20 years means we're just prolonging this mass loss season dramatically,' he said. The assessment is made using 12 reference glaciers. Last winter saw low levels of snowfall, and June was the second warmest on record, contributing to the day's early arrival this year. In data going back to 2000, the only time that the tipping point arrived even earlier was in 2022, when it came on June 26. 'That was really a game-changer for us glaciologists because it was the first year when we saw absolutely extreme melting. 'Everything that we knew before about glacier melting changed,' said Huss. Experts thought 2022 was a complete outlier and although a warming climate meant other such years would be coming down the line, they did not expect to see the next very early glacier loss day coming so soon afterwards. Feedback effect Huss noted that extreme melting produces an accelerating feedback effect, worsening the situation even further. Once the reflective white snow coverage from winter is gone from the top of the glacier, the darker, more absorbent grey surface of the bare ice is exposed. 'With the same amount of solar radiation, we can now melt more ice,' Huss said. With the European heatwave over the past week and the possibility of further heatwaves in July and August, 'it is very like that again it is a very bad year for Swiss glaciers', he said. Melting glaciers threatens the long-term water security for millions of people downstream who rely on them for fresh water. Much of the water that flows into the Rhine and the Rhone, two of Europe's major rivers, comes from the Alpine glaciers. — AFP
News.com.au
04-07-2025
- Climate
- News.com.au
Meltdown: Swiss glaciers hit annual tipping point weeks early
The snow and ice accumulated last winter by Switzerland's glaciers has already melted away, a monitoring service said, with Friday marking the alarming second-earliest arrival on record of the tipping point known as glacier loss day. All further melting between now and October will see the size of glaciers in the Swiss Alps shrink, according to Glacier Monitoring in Switzerland (GLAMOS). This century, the tipping point, on average, has been reached in mid-August -- itself already bad news for the nation's 1,400 glaciers, which are shrinking at a staggering rate. Its arrival several weeks earlier on July 4 is "another alarm call", GLAMOS chief Matthias Huss told AFP. "It's like the glaciers are shouting out: 'We're disappearing. Help us.'" Glaciers in the Swiss Alps began to retreat about 170 years ago. The retreat was initially modest but in recent decades, melting has accelerated significantly as the climate warms. The volume of Swiss glaciers shrank by 38 percent between 2000 and 2024. - Summer of destruction - "If we have a glacier loss day, it means that the glacier is losing mass," said Huss. "For a glacier that is healthy, the day would occur at the end of September, or in October -- or not at all". With no glacier loss day, the summer would simply melt away only the snow that accumulated over the previous winter. This would be "the ideal case -- a glacier in equilibrium with the climate", said Huss. Its arrival on July 4 means that "critically, we have the whole summer left to destroy the ice". "Moving this day forward by five to six weeks before the normal date over the last 20 years means we're just prolonging this mass loss season dramatically," he said. The assessment is made using 12 reference glaciers. Last winter saw low levels of snowfall, and June was the second warmest on record, contributing to the day's early arrival this year. In data going back to 2000, the only time that the tipping point arrived even earlier was in 2022, when it came on June 26. "That was really a game-changer for us glaciologists because it was the first year when we saw absolutely extreme melting. "Everything that we knew before about glacier melting changed," said Huss. Experts thought 2022 was a complete outlier and although a warming climate meant other such years would be coming down the line, they did not expect to see the next very early glacier loss day coming so soon afterwards. - Feedback effect - Huss noted that extreme melting produces an accelerating feedback effect, worsening the situation even further. Once the reflective white snow coverage from winter is gone from the top of the glacier, the darker, more absorbent grey surface of the bare ice is exposed. "With the same amount of solar radiation, we can now melt more ice," Huss said. With the European heatwave over the past week and the possibility of further heatwaves in July and August, "it is very like that again it is a very bad year for Swiss glaciers", he said. Melting glaciers threatens the long-term water security for millions of people downstream who rely on them for fresh water.
South China Morning Post
15-06-2025
- Science
- South China Morning Post
Swiss glaciers face another difficult year after 13% snow deficit
The amount of snow covering Swiss glaciers at the end of the winter this year was 13 per cent below the 2010-2020 average, said a group of glacier monitoring experts last month. Each spring, when snow cover reaches its peak, Matthias Huss, head of the Glacier Monitoring Switzerland (Glamos), and his team take measurements on several Swiss glaciers. Scientists measured the snow on 1,400 Swiss glaciers. They then used these numbers to estimate the snow on all of them. Their report shows that the amount of snow this year is 13 per cent less than it was on average between the years 2010 and 2020. They say this is a 'winter snow deficit'. The measurements examine both the depth and density of the snow, providing useful data to evaluate the upcoming summer melting season. 'Overall, snow measurements on glaciers indicate another dry year with significant repercussions on melting in the coming summer,' Huss said on X. 'Another difficult year for glaciers ahead,' he added. Snow cover is vital for glaciers as it allows them to 'recharge' their mass while protecting them from heat and sunlight in spring and summer. Swiss glaciers, severely impacted by climate change, melted as much in 2022 and 2023 as between 1960 and 1990, losing in total about 10 per cent of their volume. Despite a very snowy 2024 winter, glaciers in Switzerland still lost 2.4 per cent of their overall volume last year due to summer heat. Also, dust from the Sahara Desert made the ice melt even faster. The accumulation of dust on the ice reduces the albedo effect (see graphic).
