For the first time in the entire observation period, it started to rain instead of snow in Greenland. The reason lies in the unprecedented rise in temperature.
As reported by CNN TV channel, over the weekend the thermometer on the island exceeded zero. This is the third record rise in temperature over the past decade. Environmentalists say Greenland is warming up quickly. Ted Scambos, Senior Fellow at the National Snow and Ice Data Center at the University of Colorado, says:
“What is happening is not just a warm decade or two in a changing climate. This is unprecedented. “
At the same time, scientists note an increase in the frequency of weather phenomena unusual for Greenland: increased winds, melting ice, and now it is raining. They assume that it will affect the overall ecology of the island. Jennifer Mercer, program director of the National Science Foundation’s Polar Programs Directorate, draws attention to the formation of a thin layer of ice in the snow due to the past precipitation. The consequences of this can be different – from flooding in places where water flows from the mountains into the lowlands to the fact that “this crust will be forever imprinted in the layers of the Greenland ice sheet.” She says that the weather in Greenland “over the past 10 years has gone beyond what is considered normal.”
Researchers from Denmark discovered in August that the Greenland ice sheet was undergoing massive melting. This happened during a heatwave that caused the thermometers to rise 10 degrees above the seasonal norm. In the north of Greenland, the temperature has exceeded 20 ° C, which is 2 times higher than the average summer temperature. The warming has resulted in Greenland’s daily loss of approximately 8 billion tons of ice.
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