If Antarctic ice melts, sea level will rise even higher than predicted. WION Nov 5 report w transcript, Heating Planet blog

Antarctic meltdown is no longer a slow motion disaster, it's speeding up. If glaciers like Hektaria keep falling into the sea, no nation will stay untouched. Sea level will rise 1.5. or more meters. Right now, warm ocean currents are tunneling beneath Southern Hemisphere ice shelves, eroding them from below, while surface melting cracks them from above WATCH: Antarctic Glacier Retreat Breaks All Records, Sparks Sea Level Panic | GRAVITAS, WION Nov 5 report, transcript below [WION Description WION -The World is One News, examines global issues with in-depth analysis. We provide much more than the news of the day. From India since 2016]

TRANSCRIPT

The world's ice fortress is breaking. A sudden seismic shift in the Antarctic has started. Silent but devastating. The unthinkable now hanging on the tide. A catastrophe that could redefine every part of our planet. Antarctica holds 70% of Earth's fresh water. [Music] Trapped in ancient ice enough to drown every city on the planet. Its glaciers are silent giants. 

Now those giants are cracking. 

One of its fastest shrinking glaciers, Hektoria Glacier, is collapsing at a pace that has scientists alarmed. Hektoria retreated by 8.2 km. That will be nearly ten times faster than any grounded glacia recorded before. Its ice front is retreating faster than any model predicted, pouring billions of tons of melt water into the southern ocean. 

Of course, the Antarctica ice sheet is worrying because if it collapses, then the sea level rise would be much higher. And the impacts of a much higher sea level rise up to 1.5. or more meters  would be extreme because there are so many people living in lowlying coastal areas  that it would have a major impact on cities  on coastal cities on coastal infrastructures in general. 

2.02

Researchers warn this could mark the beginning of a self-reinforcing collapse. Warm ocean currents are tunneling beneath the ice shelves, eroding them from below, while surface melting cracks them from above. Once gone, they cannot grow back in human time scales. 

Why is West Antarctica so important is because it contains enough ice to raise sea levels by four, five, even up to  6 m. Um, so it's very important to understand what happened to West Antarctica because if Antarctica collapses the next time the earth is at plus 3°, it will be hundreds of millions of people which will have to be displaced. 

The fear is simple. If Hektoria Glacier goes, others may follow. Together with nearby glaciers like Thwaites and Pine Island, it acts as a in the bottle, holding back the West Antarctic ice sheet. 

At the same time, the United Nations Climate Report warns the planet is now very likely to exceed 1.5.° C of warming within the next decade, the critical threshold scientists have fought to avoid. That warming accelerates melt rates exponentially. 

***

[KE: Everything climate scientists predicted about global warming since the 1970s is coming true, only faster.]