A report found that Swiss glaciers lost 10% of their volume in just two years. Scientists say the burning of fossil fuels is causing climate disruption, resulting in unusually hot summers and minimal snow cover in winter, leading to accelerated melting of glaciers. The same amount of snow will be lost in the hot summers of 2022 and 2023 as was lost from 1960 to 1990.
An analysis by the Swiss Academy of Sciences found that 4% of Switzerland's glaciers have disappeared this year, the second-largest annual decline on record. The largest drop will occur in 2022, with a drop of 6%, the largest thaw since measurements were taken.
Experts have stopped measuring the amount of ice in some glaciers because they are essentially empty of ice. The Swiss Glacier Monitoring Center (Glamos), which monitors 176 glaciers, recently stopped measuring the Sankt-Anna-Fijn glacier in Uri canton in central Switzerland because most of the glacier has melted.
Matthias Huss, director of Grimos, said: "We only have some 'dead ice' left. Climate change makes such extreme events more likely, coupled with the extremely bad effects of extreme weather, the two combine. If we continue like this... we will see bad years like this every year."
He said small glaciers are disappearing because they are flowing away so quickly. He said emissions must be halted to stop Switzerland's glaciers disappearing, but added that even if the world managed to limit warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, only a third of Switzerland's glaciers were expected to remain.
He said this means "no matter what, all the small glaciers will disappear and the big glaciers will become smaller." But he stressed that at least "there will still be some glaciers in the highest areas of the Alps, and we can still show some to our children and grandchildren."
The Swiss Alps have experienced record warmth this year. August is the peak season of snowmelt, and the Swiss Meteorological Service found that the altitude where precipitation freezes reached a new high overnight, reaching 5,289 meters (17,350 feet), which is higher than Mont Blanc. This surpassed last year's record of 5,184 metres.
As the snow and ice melt, the scenery on the mountain is changing. Hus discovered that, for the first time in history, new lakes had formed beside the glacier tongue. As the ice sheet shrinks, some long-lost bodies are being recovered.
Records in Switzerland mainly date back to 1960, with some glaciers dating back to 1914.