Researchers believe there is no hope for a rapidly-melting region of the West-Antarctic Ice sheet.
The glacier is now melting into the sea, and there is most likely nothing anybody can do about it, a NASA news release reported.
Melting glaciers strongly contribute to sea-level rise, and 40 years-worth of data suggests they "have passed the point of no return," lead author Eric Rignot, of UC Irvine and NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) said in the news release. These glaciers contain enough ice to raise sea levels by four feet.
"This sector will be a major contributor to sea level rise in the decades and centuries to come," Rignot said. "A conservative estimate is it could take several centuries for all of the ice to flow into the sea."
Three factors tipped off the researchers to the rapid melting of the glaciers: "the changes in their flow speeds, how much of each glacier floats on seawater, and the slope of the terrain they are flowing over and its depth below sea level," the news release reported.
Almost all melting occurs on the underside of the glacier where it meets the land, called the "grounding line."
"The grounding line is buried under a thousand or more meters of ice, so it is incredibly challenging for a human observer on the ice sheet surface to figure out exactly where the transition is," Rignot said. "This analysis is best done using satellite techniques."
The satellites used a technique dubbed radar interferometry that gives researchers a precise look at how fast the Earth's surface is moving.
As the glaciers' flow increases they thin out, making them lighter and lifting them to the bedrock. As the grounding line retreats the resistance below the glacier is reduced as more of it becomes afloat.
In order for these glaciers to stop changing there would need to be "pinning points," or bumps and hills rising from the glacier bed to hold the ice in place. The researchers were not able to find any.
"The collapse of this sector of West Antarctica appears to be unstoppable," Rignot said. "The fact that the retreat is happening simultaneously over a large sector suggests it was triggered by a common cause, such as an increase in the amount of ocean heat beneath the floating sections of the glaciers. At this point, the end of this sector appears to be inevitable."
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