Our planet is getting warmer every year, but over the last couple of years in the Swiss alps that’s on epic display. And while glaciers in Switzerland lost a record amount of ice last year, 2023 was just as bad. Veuer’s Tony Spit has the details.
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00:00Our planet is getting warmer every year, but over the last couple of years in the Swiss Alps that's
00:04on epic display. And while glaciers in Switzerland lost a record amount of ice last year, 2023 was
00:10just as bad. A recent report by Glacier Monitoring Switzerland, or GLAMOS, indicated that Swiss
00:16glaciers have lost some 10% of their total volume in the last two years alone. According to Matthias
00:21Hus, lead researcher at GLAMOS, that's the same amount of ice that was lost over the course of
00:26the 1960s, 70s and 80s combined. Here's Hus to explain. This year was very problematic for
00:33glaciers because there was really little snow in winter, almost record low snow depths, and the
00:40summer was very warm. The combination of these two factors is the worst that can happen to glaciers.
00:45And then of course there is climate change that makes such extreme events as we have seen them
00:52in the last two years much more likely. This means areas that were once fields of snow and
00:57ice are now simply rock, with the freezing line now much higher than in previous years.
01:01Experts say that water will only freeze above an altitude of 17,350 feet, nearly 350 feet higher
01:09than last year, which they add is likely due to how climate change is affecting the region,
01:13with temperatures rising in the Alps by around twice the global average.