If you think the summer this year was hot and you couldn’t bear the heat, well, get ready for more in the future.
The ice caps of this world are melting at an unprecedented rate since the last 450 years!
Scientists also believe that the cryosphere of the Earth has not seen ice melt similar to this in 5000 years. Global warming is something that humans have become familiar with, recently.
But global warming at this rate is going to prove fatal.
How Bad Is The Arctic Right Now?
Suddenly in 2003, scientists saw ice sheets in Greenland melt at a very high rate, for a reason very obvious – global warming. Who is to blame for it – us, humans.
Ice sheet run off after 2003 has increased almost by 80% and still They continue to melt away into catchments at a very high rate. If this high rate of melting continues and all ice sheets water away into oceans and seas, the global sea levels will increase by 20 feet!
Greenland especially is seeing a very tremendous melt away of ice sheets. It contains roughly about 8% of the world’s ice and is losing 270 billion tonnes, on an average, each year.
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How Is India Going To Get Affected By It?
Like every other country through which the equator passes, India will see a temperate rise of 2 degrees every summer. Now that might seem like a little increase, but we are already at 55 degree Celsius at several places in the country.
Mangroves, which need a significantly moist environment to breed in, will suffer due to the heat. The ice caps melting change the dimensions of monsoon, hence affecting flora and fauna at a larger level too.
Birds of rarity which fly to the Indian Delta will eventually migrate elsewhere because a majority of the delta region has already started to see a decline in the water levels.
With increase in heat, more deaths will be witnessed in the country due to two major reasons – food scarcity, and intense heat strokes and dehydration. 18% more heatstroke deaths, drought deaths to be seen in 5 years.
Much more than human life only, is at stake here. We will see a 36% decline in flora and 45% decline in fauna in the next 10 years if polar ice caps melt at this rate.
About 30 years ago, humans almost saved the planet from this harsh climate change, but we went wrong at certain places which led to failure of the plan.
Summits kept taking place, leaders of nations kept meeting, but all we did was little trials to save the earth. The big steps have never been taken.
This melting of ice sheets makes the slabs move faster towards the coasts which could case even more icebergs to calve into the ocean. Many more titanic tragedies are on their way if we don’t do something about this matter of grave concern.
Image Source: Google Images
Sources: Vox, Green Clean Guide, Inside Climate News
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