A “Global Glacier Casualty List” is being set up by scientists to keep tabs on the ice sheets that fall victim to climate change. If things continue as they are, the database will have a lot of work on its hands: two-thirds of the world’s glaciers are on track to disappear by the end of this century.
The project is being led by researchers from Rice University who were inspired by the world’s first glacier funeral that took place in Iceland in 2018. Although purely a symbolic gesture, the funeral for Okjökull was an attention-grabbing event that beautifully highlights what climate change threatens to destroy.
“The Okjökull memorial inspired a number of glaciologists around the world to take stock of how many glaciers had already disappeared in their countries,” Professor Cymene Howe, a cultural anthropologist at Rice University, said in a statement.
“A 2023 study calculated that 264 glaciers had melted away in New Zealand alone. In China, more than 8,300 glaciers have disappeared in the past several decades. With the Global Glacier Casualty List, we will feature 15 recently lost and critically endangered glaciers around the world, and we will work with scientists and communities to add to the list each year as glaciers continue to expire,” said Howe.
The project has been set up ahead of 2025, which the United Nations has designated as the International Year of Glaciers’ Preservation.
The launch of the list will coincide with the unveiling of the world’s first Glacier Graveyard on August 17 on the Seltjarnarnes peninsula near the Icelandic capital of Reykjavík. The graveyard will feature 15 headstones carved from ice by Icelandic ice sculptor Ottó Magnússon and will bear the names of glaciers from around the world that have been lost to global warming.
A prototype of the ice headstones.
Image credit: Ottó Magnússon/Rice University
“Like their glacial counterparts, these monuments will also melt away, but the ceremony and icy headstones will serve as poignant reminders that the world’s glaciers are doomed to the same fate without quick action,” Howe said.
It might sound a little bit sentimental, but climate change and the melting of glaciers will have a very serious impact on the real world.
Thawing glacial ice contributes to the rise in global sea levels, posing a threat to coastal communities, low-lying areas, and island nations, as well as increasing the risk of flooding and erosion. The loss of glaciers also profoundly affects natural ecosystems, economies, societies, and cultures.
The Northern Hemisphere is often the focus of attention when it comes to glacier loss, but warming temperatures are altering cryospheric systems around the world, from the equatorial glaciers of Man Jaya in Indonesia to the ice-capped continent of Antarctica.
Earlier this month, researchers published a study that glaciers in South America’s Andes Mountains are the smallest they’ve been in at least 11,700 years since the last Ice Age – a dramatic hint that Earth is undergoing a rapid and intense change.
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