Mountains Are Melting

Yes, it's official, we really haven't been imagining it all. According to this story from The Associated Press, mountains worldwide are melting after the 'hottest century for 1000 years.

Scientists took samples from the core of a glacier on the flank on the 26,293-foot Xixabangma which shows a century of ongoing warming leading to the rapid melting of high mountain permanent ice fields in areas like the Himalayas, Andes and on Kilimanjaro.

More worryingly, high ice fields seem to be melting more rapidly than the global average. One associated effect may, somewhat ironically, be a reduction in the dry season flow rates of rivers depending on glacial melt, which are crucial to agriculture.

This may seem counter-intuitive, after all if ice is melting, there should be more, not less, water, but the reality is that less total ice means less melt.

This just confirms what climbers have realised for some time. Glaciers worldwide are receding at a considerable rate - there are passes in the Cordillera Real in Bolivia, which just 20 years ago were glaciated yet are now moraine fields, meanwhile, melting in Peru and the Alps has led to the build up of high mountain lakes held back by fragile barriers of mud and scree. When the barriers give way, huge tidal waves swamp local towns and villages.