Iceberg Meltdown in Antarcticaby Anishka Jha | 19-08-2017 01:14 |
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![]() Anytime we do anything, it has environmental consequences. Even doing nothing has environmental consequences. One of these drastic consequences can be the melting of icebergs. Icebergs are calving or falling into the water and then floating around as shipping hazards while they melt. According to the Environmental Protection Agency, the EPA, in the last 100 years the sea level has risen about 6 to 8 inches. A variety of things are causing this rise but the thing that is triggering all this seems to be climate change. Antarctica accounts for 90 percent of the world?s ice, which is where many icebergs come from. A recent iceberg meltdown in Antarctica has evidenced the fact I have mentioned above. It was a trillion-tonne iceberg and one of the largest ever recorded. Scientists have been monitoring a growing crack for years at this spot. The massive ice cube was larger than the US state of Delaware, had a volume twice the size of Lake Erie, in North America. It is about 350 metres thick. The meltdown of this humongous iceberg will directly lead to problems pertaining to the climate and environment. This is known because previously when icebergs or glaciers melted it had adverse effects on the planet. There are people and places all over the world that are affected by the melting of an iceberg. For instance, in Bangladesh, over one million people have been displaced do to the rising sea and the rising rivers: the Ganges and the Brahmaputra. It is expected that if no action is taken, that thirteen million more people will lose their homes in the near future. This flood occurred in 1998 and later had an effect in 2004 too. This just proves that change in climate can cause so much trouble to human lives in different parts of the world.
It is my opinion these effects of the melting ice caps and glaciers and the consequent rising of the oceans is a big problem. Its just one of the ways that global warming is negatively affecting our environment and it affects are damaging to just about every nation on Earth. The melting of glaciers and icebergs may not seem so damaging, but it?s a major warning sign of what can occur with global warming, and it affects every aspect of life on Earth. |