
A hanging glacier broke off at a national park in Chile's Patagonia region due to high temperatures and weakened ice walls owing to rains. A video posted on social media shows a 200-metre piece of glacier atop a mountain crack and then cascade into the valley below.
Experts say that such incidents aren't unusual, but the problem arises when they become too frequent. The incident happened at Queulat National Park, located more than 1,200 kilometres (746 miles) south of Chile's capital.
University of Santiago climate scientist Raul Cordero said, "Such a type of event is triggered by heat waves or by intense liquid precipitation events and both things are happening more and more frequently throughout the planet, not only in Chile."
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According to Cordero, there was a heat wave with "very abnormal" temperatures in that area of Patagonia before the collapse.
Cordero added that an "atmospheric river" consisting of relatively warm air laden with moisture was also recorded. When this "river meets with Andean and Patagonian topography, it forms large clouds and discharges precipitation".
Global warming is "destabilizing several glaciers and in particular some unstable glacier walls", Cordero said. "That is the case of what happened in the last few days in Patagonia in a similar way to what happened a couple of months ago in both the Himalayas and the Alps," Reuters quoted him as saying.
(With inputs from agencies)