Layers of snow that have lasted for millennia are melting today largely because of Carbon emissions.
Glacial melt has onerous consequences on humanity. Melting icebergs and glaciers will add to sea level rise. This sea level rise can cause coastal calamities like storms, cyclones, coastal incursions, devastation of littoral or coastal forests, squalls, hail, flash floods, floods, famine, epidemics, and on the other side of the spectrum other extreme weather events like drought, desertification, follow. Such frequent and colossal damage because of extreme weather events can decimate human populations. Building resilience has to ensure that human society adapts to environmental demands lest the Climate quotient will become a vicious cycle triggering more extreme weather events because of Climate Change.
Though melting icecaps in the polar regions will likely face maximum short term damage like iceberg-collapse-triggered-tsunamis for instance, the near term damage on account of sea level rise will be felt most in the middle latitudes of the Tropical belt of planet Earth ... a region known for stable weather.
Glacial melt is rapidly exposing the bedrock and baring geology of polar and mountainous regions ... Cynics claim this exposure makes the land more vulnerable to unsustainable economic exploitation like mining.
What if a dam's backwaters freeze due to a future Climate Change? It will cause unprecedented water shortage. Climate Change cycles alternate - obviously. Chronic drought and desertification, famine and epidemics will follow in the Tropics. The vicious cycle will be broken by flash floods, floods, forest fire, extreme humidity, drought, desertification, epidemics, famine, mutation of viruses, and when the moisture returns mudslides landslides squalls, storms follow. This kind of cycles have happened before - ironically not because of industrial emissions or Carbon footprint. Super Volcanic explosions have triggered volcanic winters leading to freezing seas. The "Last Glacial Maximum" caused species extinction, wildlife migration among other very scientific exploits of Mother Earth. This time around leaders are desperately trying to decrease global warming to 2 degrees centigrade.
The slightest crack in glaciers reveals thousands ... nay millions of years of absorption (by glaciers) of CFCs and GHGs - or Carbon emissions.
This is a picture of a river turning into a flash flood.
Pictures: Pixabay.
Photo captions,: Malini Shankar
Links for further reading
funeral for a melting glacier
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