A great danger to Earth… the discovery of a time bomb that threatens the world
A report published by the British newspaper “Daily Mail” said that a new study concluded that more than 100 volcanoes located under the surface of the ice sheet in West Antarctica are on their way to erupting and are “particularly vulnerable to collapse.”
Scientists have warned that climate change is causing the ice sheet to melt, leading to increased volcanic activity that accelerates the melting of ice on the surface, creating a “positive feedback loop.”
As the ice sheet melts, the amount of mass pressing down on the surface decreases, creating a pleasing effect in the Earth’s interior. This in turn allows magma chambers deep within the continent to expand, accelerating the processes that lead to eruption by putting pressure on the chamber walls and releasing the gas trapped within.
When volcanoes erupt, this leads to more melting on the surface, and the process starts all over again.
The researchers modeled this phenomenon using more than 4,000 advanced computer simulations, and found that surface melting accelerates the process, which begins its early stages within tens to hundreds of years.
In one of the scenarios that scientists came up with, the research team removed an ice layer with a thickness of 3,280 feet over the course of 300 years, which is considered moderate melting in West Antarctica, and they found a significant increase in volcanic activity and the size of explosions.
Some chambers released enough heat to melt more than three million cubic feet of ice annually.
Scientists found that increased volcanic eruptions from many volcanoes in the West Antarctica ice sheet would not directly harm human communities, as the continent is largely uninhabited. But they may cause indirect damage by accelerating sea level rise, threatening coastal communities.
If the ice sheet collapses completely, sea levels could rise by 190 feet. This would submerge entire coastal cities such as New York, Tokyo and Shanghai, making them uninhabitable, according to the study.
Fortunately, scientists believe the apocalyptic scenario is still far away, with the latest estimates predicting the near-complete collapse of the West Antarctic ice sheet by 2300, giving humanity 275 years to try to slow its decline.
But because the models that produced this estimate did not take into account the feedback loop between melting and volcanic activity, according to the researchers, the actual date of the collapse could be much closer, although more research is needed to determine whether this is actually the case.
However, the new study suggests that volcanic activity beneath the ice sheet may play a larger role in its decline than experts previously thought.
Current predictions of sea level rise depend on scientists’ ability to predict the stability of the West Antarctica ice sheet, which is roughly twice the size of Alaska and is particularly vulnerable to collapse for a number of reasons.
The researchers used a model to simulate how different drops in magma chamber pressure affect the melting of the ice sheet. They also explored how loss of surface mass due to melting allows magma chambers to expand, reducing pressure inside and ultimately changing the course of future eruptions. (Arabic)
