A ridiculous amount of ice.
Following months of record temperatures, scientists say that Greenland’s ice sheet experienced its biggest melt of the summer on Thursday, losing 11 billion tons of surface ice to the ocean.
This is the equivalent of losing 4.4 million Olympic swimming pools worth of ice, in one day.
The ice sheet in Greenland does tend to melt every summer, but not normally at the rate it has done this summer.
According to CNN, the ice sheet usually melts during the summer, but the melt season typically begins around the end of May; this year it began at the start.
A video was posted by scientist Laurie Garett of the roaring glacial melt, which has been shared widely since.
This is a roaring glacial melt, under the bridge to Kangerlussiauq, Greenland where it's 22C today and Danish officials say 12 billions tons of ice melted in 24 hours, yesterday. pic.twitter.com/Rl2odG4xWj
— Laurie Garrett (@Laurie_Garrett) August 1, 2019
Roughly 82% of the surface of Greenland is covered in ice, but climate scientists with the Danish Meterological Institute have found it is melting at a record rate.
It comes in a summer where the Arctic has experienced “unprecedented” wildfires, which scientists say have been facilitated by high temperatures.
Temperature records have also been broken around Europe in the past number of weeks, including London breaking its July temperature record just last week.
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