The Doomsday Glacier in Antarctica, nicknamed because of what it could cause, is going through unexpected complications, according to research published in the scientific journal Nature.
The Last Judgment Glacier
He Thwaites Glacier is one of the largest in West Antarctica. It is the size of Florida and has a width of approximately 120 kilometers, so it contains large volumes of ice. This is why it has been kept under surveillance for several years, because if it were to collapse, enormous amounts of water would enter the ocean and cause an alarming rise in sea level, hence the nickname ‘the glacier of Judgment’. Final’.
The dynamics of the glacier is not simple, since it is shaped like a platform that surrounds the coasts of the Occidental. It acts like a cork, retaining the glacier on dry land and with this, gives a important protection to the frozen complexes of the continent; Therefore, it is also a fundamental barrier against the increase of .
But like the , Antarctica is facing major challenges in the face of the escalating climate crisis. The most valuable ice surfaces in the world not only at the atmospheric level, but also the marine currents that make glaciers and ice shelves more vulnerable every day.
Due to these conditions, Thwaites, the Doomsday Glacier, has grown almost 14 kilometers since the late 1990s and is responsible for 4% of the annual rise in sea level.
Terraces and cracks run through Thwaites
To better understand the weathering of the Doomsday Glacier, a team of researchers from the Thwaites Glacier Collaboration traveled to West Antarctica. Using a hot drill, they drilled a 600-meter-deep hole in the ice and for five days collected information through various instruments inserted into the glacier.
The data points to an unexpectedly lower rate of melting beneath the mostly flat part of the shelf. They found a melting rate of 2 to 5.4 meters per year, which is lower than the projections given by previous models. But it’s not all good news, they also discovered that there is a much more complex underwater glacial landscape than previously thought.
Certain underwater parts of the Doomsday Glacier are dominated by strange staircase-shaped terraces and crevices, which is greatly worrying since some of the cracks cross the entire ice shelf. They found that the melting was particularly faster in these regions than in other parts of the glacier, they believe that It is likely that hot salty water could have funneled through the cracks, widening them and contributing to the platform’s instability.
Researchers have said that the cracks could become the main trigger that leads Thwaites to collapse, which is why the research is of great importance, as it could help generate projections necessary to mitigate the impacts of the crisis and safeguard the lives of vulnerable people. in the face of sea level rise.
It is believed that the total collapse of the Doomsday Glacier could add up to 70 centimeters to sea level, but this would only be the beginning. By losing the largest barrier in West Antarctica, other ice regions would be vulnerable and in total the Thwaites melt could add up to three meters to the current sea level,
References: Davis, PED, Nicholls, KW, Holland, DM et al. Suppressed basal melting in the eastern Thwaites Glacier grounding zone. Nature 614, 479–485 (2023),