East Antarctica's glaciers are stirring

[nitpicker]

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-46517396

East Antarctica's glaciers are stirring

By Jonathan Amos
BBC Science Correspondent, Washington DC

6 hours ago


Nasa says it has detected the first signs of significant melting in a swathe of glaciers in East Antarctica. The region has long been considered stable and unaffected by some of the more dramatic changes occurring elsewhere on the continent. But satellites have now shown that ice streams running into the ocean along one-eighth of the eastern coastline have thinned and sped up.

If this trend continues, it has consequences for future sea levels. There is enough ice in the drainage basins in this sector of Antarctica to raise the height of the global oceans by 28m - if it were all to melt out.
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Previously, scientists had been aware that the region's Totten Glacier was experiencing melting, most probably as a result of its terminus being affronted by warm water coming up from the deep ocean. Pretty much everything else in that part of the continent was considered stagnant, however.

The new satellite elevation and velocity maps change this view. They make it clear that nearby glaciers to Totten are also starting to respond in a similar way. Marked change is detected in the Vincennes Bay and Denman areas just to the west, and in Porpoise Bay and on the George VI coast to the east.

Vincennes Bay - which includes the Underwood, Bond, Adams, and Vanderford glaciers - has the most pronounced loss in ice mass. Elevation is dropping at five times the rate it was in 2008 - with a total fall in height over the period of almost 3m.
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