Scientists worried as Antarctic sea ice hits lowest levels ever recorded

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Antarctic sea ice reached record low levels for the third time in six years, alarming polar scientists. Across four decades of satellite observations, there has never been less ice around the continent than there was last week, reported The Guardian on Saturday.

In 2022, the amount of sea ice dropped to 1.92m sq km on 25 February, said the report. This was an all-time low based on satellite observations that started in 1979. The record was broken on February 12 this year and the sea ice level reached a new record low of 1.79m sq km on 25 February. It beat the previous record by 136,000 sq km – an area double the size of Tasmania.

Dr Will Hobbs, an Antarctic sea ice expert at the University of Tasmania with the Australian Antarctic Program Partnership, told The Guardian that it is a “circumpolar event” and they are seeing less ice everywhere.

Hobbs said large areas in the west of the continent had barely recovered from the previous year’s losses. “Because sea ice is so reflective, it’s hard to melt from sunlight. But if you get open water behind it, that can melt the ice from underneath,” said Hobbs.

According to The Guardian report, Antarctica holds enough ice to raise sea levels by many meters if it was to melt. There is an indirect relation between melting sea ice and the rise of sea levels. Sea ice helps to buffer the effect of storms on ice attached to the coast. If it starts to disappear for longer, the increased wave action can weaken those floating ice shelves that themselves stabilise the massive ice sheets and glaciers behind them on the land.

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