What caused a giant Antarctic lake to completely disappear in three days?
Before (left) and after drainage (right) | Image by NASA
A giant ice-covered lake in Antarctica disappeared into thin air, causing panic among the scientific community. According to researchers, the lake disappeared in 2019’s winter season on the Amery Ice Shelf in East Antarctica.
Estimates claim that 600-750 million cubic metres (21-26 billion cubic feet) of water drained into the ocean. Once the ice shelf beneath the lake gave way, the water drained in less than three days, as per observations from satellites.
What really happened?
According to Roland Warner, a glaciologist at the University of Tasmania and lead author of the new study focusing on this event in a statement said that the water’s weight in this lake created a fissure in the ice-shelf beneath the lake.
This caused “the water to drain away to the ocean below”, he said. And this process has a name. Called “hydrofracturing”, this phenomenonoccurs when water which is denser and heavier than ice cracks ice sheets open, causing major drainage into the sea.To help with measurements, researches used observations from NASA’s ICESat-2 satellite which helps scientists find the elevation of a target.
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In the aftermath of such events, the structural integrity of the ice sheet as a whole is compromised with a gigantic fissure left behind.
The dangers of hydrofracturing
Climate change is melting ice caps faster than ever imagined by scientists and water levels continue to threaten coastal cities and towns across the world.
Scientists fear that as more surface water continues to melt, more instances of hydrofracturing could take place - at a scale unseen before. In turn, this could increase the flow of fresh water into the ocean.
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As a natural consequence, sea levels around the globe could rise much faster than previously calculated.
The study was published in the journal titled “Geophysical Research Letters” on June 23. The authors claim that surface melting in Antarctica is expected to double by 2050, increasing fears of ice shelves’ deterioration.
In the study, authors noted that hydro fracture remains an understudied process, making its consequences unpredictable.