When looking at most world records, they seem remarkably unbeatable. However, scientists in Antarctica have just set a new record as to the deepest hole ever made. The British Antarctic Survey, which led the BEAMINH (Bed Access, Monitoring and Ice Sheet History) project, announced that on January 8th, their team had excavated a hole of over 7,000 feet in Antarctic ice.
This announcement came simultaneously with a bombshell study that was released on January 14th in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. According to the scientists that conducted the study, Antarctica’s ice is disappearing at six times the rate as it was forty years ago. It stated that on average, between 2009 and 2017, 252 billion metric tons of ice was lost per year. This is more than six times the average annual rate in the 1980’s of 40 billion tons.
These changes are largely considered to be an effect of climate change. If current rates continue, scientists project that sea levels could increase by up to three feet globally if no changes are made to global carbon emissions. If all of Antarctica’s ice melts, there will be up to 187.66 feet of sea-level rise. This, however, is unlikely in the near future.
