🔗 Share this article

Deep in California’s Sierra Nevada, massive ice formations are vanishing and projected to melt away entirely by the beginning of the next century, resulting in ice-free peaks for the first time in human history, recent studies has found.

Age-Old Beginnings of Sierra Range Ice Masses

The range's ice sheets are older than earlier understood, dating back many thousands of years, with a few as ancient as the last ice age, according to an article published last week.

“Our pieced-together glacial history indicates that a coming ice-free Sierra Nevada is without precedent in human history since documented settlement of the Americas around twenty thousand years ago,” the article declares.

Worldwide Threat to Glaciers

Ice masses globally are under threat amid the climate crisis. A research released in May of the current year found that nearly 40% of glaciers are destined to thaw because of global heating. If this warming rises by 2.7 degrees Celsius, which the planet is presently on track for, as many as seventy-five percent will vanish, leading to ocean level increase and large-scale relocation.

Across the American west, ice formations have diminished substantially since they were initially recorded in the late 19th century, according to the report.

Concentration on Major Ice Bodies

The new research centers on four Sierra Nevada glaciers – the Palisade, Lyell, Maclure and Conness ice sheets – that are among the largest and probably most ancient in the range. Their durability amid global heating makes them “indicators” for studying glacier disappearance in the western region, the article states.

Study Techniques and Findings

Scientists examined newly uncovered base rock around the ice formations and took samples to ascertain how long the region was blanketed by ice. They determined that the ice masses have covered swaths of the range for far longer than earlier believed – since prior to people inhabited North America.

California’s glacial sheets reached their maximum positions as early as thirty thousand years ago, the article’s authors stated, and a particular of the ice bodies researchers studied is believed to have grown seven thousand years ago, sooner than previously believed. The disappearance of glaciers, for the initial time in recorded history, shows the profound effects of the climate crisis, one author of the study said.

Environmental and Symbolic Impact

“We’ll be the first to witness the ice-free peaks,” said Andrew Jones, the principal investigator. “This has ecological implications for flora and fauna. And it’s a representational decline. Global warming is highly intangible, but these ice masses are tangible. They’re iconic features of the Western U.S..”