Antarctica’s ‘Doomsday Glacier’ is melting away differently than scientists first thought

Researchers monitoring the rapid melting of the world’s widest glacier now have a better understanding of its natural processes due to an extensive deployment of probes and warn that trouble looms due to a warming climate.

Findings recently published in the journal Nature said changes under the Thwaites Glacier are different from what researchers first believed.

Scientists reported melting below the ice shelf is slower than many computer models estimated, but observations also determined that thawing in cracks and crevasses is happening faster.

Despite the new theories about Antarctica’s Florida-sized glacier, a joint UK-US research program, known as the International Thwaites Glacier Collaboration, said since the 1990s, around 8.7 miles of what used to be ice touching the seafloor has disappeared.