🔗 Share this article

Deep in the state of Sierra mountain range, massive glaciers are disappearing and projected to dissolve completely by the beginning of the coming hundred years, resulting in ice-free peaks for the initial occasion in human history, recent studies has discovered.

Age-Old Beginnings of Sierra Nevada Glaciers

The mountain range’s glaciers are more ancient than earlier understood, dating back tens of thousands of years, with some as old as the most recent glacial period, according to an article published recently.

“Our reconstructed glacial history shows that a coming ice-free Sierra Nevada is without precedent in human history since known peopling of the Americas ~20,000 years ago,” the study states.

Global Risk to Ice Formations

Glaciers globally are under threat amid the climate emergency. A study released in the month of May of the current year determined that nearly 40% of ice sheets are destined to thaw because of global heating. If this warming increases by 2.7 degrees Celsius, which the world is currently on track for, as many as seventy-five percent will vanish, causing ocean level increase and large-scale relocation.

Across the American west, glaciers have diminished substantially since they were initially recorded in the 1800s, according to the article.

Concentration on Key Ice Bodies

The recent study focuses on several Sierra Nevada glacial masses – the Palisade, Lyell, Maclure and Conness glaciers – that are among the biggest and probably oldest in the range. Their longevity amid climate warming makes them “indicators” for examining ice loss in the western region, the article states.

Research Methods and Results

Researchers examined newly uncovered bedrock around the ice formations and collected specimens to ascertain how long the area was blanketed by ice. They determined that the glaciers have covered large areas of the range for far longer than earlier believed – since prior to people inhabited North America.

California’s glacial sheets attained their maximum positions as long ago as thirty thousand years ago, the article’s authors wrote, and one of the glaciers researchers looked at is thought to have expanded 7,000 years ago, earlier than once thought. The loss of glaciers, for the first time in recorded history, shows the dramatic impacts of the climate crisis, one author of the study said.

Ecological and Representational Consequences

“We’ll be the initial ones to see the glacier-less summits,” said Andrew Jones, the study’s lead author. “This has ecological implications for flora and fauna. And it’s a symbolic loss. Global warming is very abstract, but these ice masses are concrete. They’re symbolic elements of the American West.”