Mt. Everest has shrunk by 10% over the last four decades and it is all because of melting ice caused by climate change, a Chinese scientist said on Thursday.
Kang Shichang, a researcher at the Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, said the data was based on long-term remote sensing and on-site monitoring of the storied mountain top. Due to ice melt, the glacial lake at the foot of the mountain is now 13 times bigger than it was in the 1970s, Kang told Xinhua news agency today.
Glaciers in the Tibetan Plateau — the highest in the world — cover an area of about 50,000 square kilometers and are sensitive to warmer weather.
Kang said ice melt has sped up since the 1990s.
Last week, a massive avalanche claimed the lives of at least 13 Mt. Everest mountain climbers in Nepal, the Press Trust of India reported. The avalanche occurred at around 6:45 am at an altitude of 19,600 feet above sea level in an area known as the “popcorn field”, which lies on the route to the dangerous Khumbu Icefall.
Over 78% of Nepal’s roughly $350 million a year tourism industry comes from trekkers looking to climb Mt. Everest, according to government figures. But the tiny country, located north of India, may not be able to count on Mt. Everest for much longer.
The lack of snow on the mountaintop contributes to more rock slides and increasingly deadly climbing. The lives of all Himalayans and local sherpa mountain guides will be effected. Climbers say it’s hotter in the summer and colder in the winter, creating problems that didn’t exist 20 years ago.
China’s research may be the most upbeat by comparison.
Research published by the Kathmandu-based International Center for Integrated Mountain Development in 2011 showed the Himalayan glaciers had shrunk by 21% over just 30 years. A three-year research project led by the same group showed 10 glaciers in the region had shrunk, with a marked acceleration in loss of ice between 2002 and 2005.
The Himalayas provide food and energy for 1.3 billion people living in downstream river basins.