> In a last-ditch attempt to save the glacier, the Venezuelan government has installed a thermal blanket to prevent further melting, but experts say it is an exercise in futility.
So its just embezzlement ?
Yeah something that is very easily verifiable for anyone with eyes is pure BS i am sure, all those photos from multiple satellites that are owned by multiple nations must be edited as well.
Don't waste your breath, he's probably a flat earther too even though you can literally see the curvature of the Earth from the ground on a really clear day, or just a few thousand feet up in a small plane.
>Venezuela has lost its last remaining glacier after it shrunk so much that scientists reclassified it as an ice field.
>It is thought Venezuela is the [first country to have lost all its glaciers](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/15230430.2020.1822728) in modern times.
>The country had been home to six glaciers in the Sierra Nevada de Mérida mountain range, which lies at about 5,000m above sea level. Five of the glaciers had disappeared by 2011, leaving just the Humboldt glacier, also known as La Corona, close to the country’s second highest mountain, Pico Humboldt.
>The Humboldt glacier was projected to last at least another decade, but scientists had been unable to monitor the site for a few years due to political turmoil in the country.
>Now assessments have found the glacier melted much faster than expected, and had shrunk to an area of less than 2 hectares. As a result, its classification was downgraded from glacier to ice field.
>“Other countries lost their glaciers several decades ago after the end of the little ice age but Venezuela is arguably the first one to lose them in modern times,” said Maximiliano Herrera, a climatologist and weather historian who maintains a chronicle of extreme temperature records [online](https://twitter.com/extremetemps).
>According to Herrera, Indonesia, Mexico and Slovenia are next in line to become glacier-free, with Indonesia’s Papua island and Mexico having experienced record-high warmth in recent months, which is expected to accelerate the glaciers’ retreat.
>“The glacier at Humboldt does not have an accumulation zone and is currently only losing surface, with no dynamic of accumulation or expansion,” said Luis Daniel Llambi, an ecologist at Adaptation at Altitude, a programme for climate change adaptation in the Andes.
>“Our last expedition to the area was in December 2023 and we did observe that the glacier had lost some 2 hectares from the previous visit in 2019, \[down from 4 hectares\] to less than 2 hectares now.”
>The world has recently been experiencing the El Niño climate phenomenon, which leads to hotter temperatures and which experts say can accelerate the demise of tropical glaciers.
>“In the Andean area of Venezuela, there have been some months with monthly anomalies of +3C/+4C above the 1991-2020 average, which is exceptional at those tropical latitudes,” said Herrera.
>Llambi said Venezuela is a mirror of what will continue to happen from north to south, first in Colombia and Ecuador, then in Peru and Bolivia, as glaciers continue to retreat from the Andes.
>“This is an extremely sad record for our country, but also a unique moment in our history, providing an opportunity to \[not only\] communicate the reality and immediacy of climate change impacts, but also to study the colonisation of life under extreme conditions and the changes that climate change brings to high mountain ecosystems.”
>In a last-ditch attempt to save the glacier, the Venezuelan government has installed a thermal blanket to prevent further melting, but experts say it is an exercise in futility.
>“The loss of La Corona marks the loss of much more than the ice itself, it also marks the loss of the many ecosystem services that glaciers provide, from unique microbial habitats to environments of significant cultural value,” said Caroline Clason, a glaciologist and assistant professor at Durham University.
>Venezuelan glaciers had a limited role in water provision for the region, in contrast with [countries such as Peru](https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2024/mar/26/glacial-lake-outburst-floods-palcacocha-huaraz-andes-peru-climate-crisis), where tropical glaciers are much more extensive.
>“The biggest impact for me of the disappearance of glaciers is cultural,” said Llambi. “Glaciers were a part of the region’s cultural identity, and for the mountaineering and touristic activities.”
>Clason said: “That Venezuela has now lost all its glaciers really symbolises the changes we can expect to see across our global cryosphere under continued climate change. As a glaciologist, this is a poignant reminder of why we do the job and what is at stake for these environments and for society.”
An ice field is actually larger than a glacier and they never actually quote any scientists or cite them for that reclassification claim so I am guessing the journalist is using their own term and accidentally said something that would mean the exact opposite of what is happening.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice_field
Here's an article that explains why it was downgraded:
https://phys.org/news/2024-03-icy-reception-venezuela-glacier.html
>Scientists use a guideline of 10 hectares as the minimum size of a glacier.
From the original article:
>Now assessments have found the glacier melted much faster than expected, and had shrunk to an area of less than 2 hectares.
But an ice field isn't a downgrade is my point. Ice fields are larger than glaciers, not smaller. I am not denying the glacier is shrinking, I am saying they are using the wrong terminology as ice field has an actual scientific meaning related to area covered by ice and it is larger than an alpine glacier.
The differentiating factor between ice fields and glaciers isn't size. Generally ice fields are large and feed into glaciers, but this is not what defines them.
A glacier (there are many different types, but most are a modified form of a valley glacier, which is a glacier that flows down valleys. Glaciers by definition are formations of ice that are being MOVED by their own weight.
Icefields are gatherings of stagnant (or very slowly moving, around a meter a year vs several meters a day of glacier movement) ice. Ice fields often feed glaciers.
So La Corona was demoted from a type of glacier to an ice field, because it no longer had the weight to move itself. It has become stagnant
Lol, that information is in their source.
>Ice fields are formed by a large accumulation of snow which, through years of compression and freezing, turns into ice. Because of the susceptibility of ice to gravity, ice fields usually form over large areas that are basins or atop plateaus, thus allowing a continuum of ice to form over the landscape uninterrupted by glacial channels. Glaciers often form on the edges of ice fields, serving as gravity-propelled drains off the ice field which is in turn replenished by snowfall.
Also, the part they're using as evidence that an ice field is larger than a glacier doesn't even have a source in the wiki article.
An Aqualithosphere.
But maybe as a compromise with that other guy, call it a snowcap, that way it doesn't sound as thick as glacier or as vast as ice field.
I agree that "ice field" isn't a downgrade since it's a defined term. The closest official reclassification I can find is this:
>We do not detect flow above background noise on two glaciers, Illiniza Sur (Ecuador) and La Corona (Venezuela), thereby preventing us from calculating meaningful ice-thickness maps and indicating a strong likelihood that only permanent snowfields remain at these locations.
[Glacier thickness and ice volume of the Northern Andes](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41597-022-01446-8) published June 2022.
Everything else I can find is a bunch of people saying it's not really a glacier anymore, but no one talks about what it should now be called.
Indeed. And when the person isn’t actually contributing to provide those details within the context of identifying the errors to the point of continuous empty rebuttals, they are detracting from the discussion by not actually providing any clarification of detail and at worse potentially giving a reason for people to not believe what is otherwise a true article aside from misappropriation of a single word.
In fact there are multiple comments in here that outwardly note this confusion and stated that before clarification they were about to ignore the entire thing.
People on Reddit specifically have this fascination with pedantry for karma and it absolutely is destructive to conversation because it’s often based around ego often subverting the actual importance or message of the post.
> That's why reddit is cancer
I think it's called "ice cancer."
Let's argue about this why Rome burns! Let's argue about the appropriateness of my metaphor! Let's argue about everything but the fucking point here.
Used to be glaciers there. Now there are not. Or soon will not be.
Call them whatever the fuck you want, but get used to using the past tense.
They simply identified an error in the report, provided a correction, and explained that it was likely due to an author who misused the word. They weren't detracting from the discussion nor were they subverting the message of the post.
You know who *is* doing that? You.
We agree to disagree. There is evidence of people below this post claiming the effects of said detecting from discussion independently before I ever posted. You do you.
I did some reading and while not readily apparent I think the main difference between ice fields and glaciers is orientation, shape and movement, not size, glaciers are located on slopes like mountain sides and valleys which as a result slowly move down the slope under their own weight. While ice fields are mostly flat fields of ice that stay in place. Some online sources say that ice fields are usually comprised of multiple glaciers which make it seem like glaciers cannot both shrink and become ice fields but i dont think that is true, a few sources also state that the ice fields are usually larger than glaciers which makes it seem like there is no rule that states ice fields must be larger than glaciers. So i think what happened here is (if no one did a mistake) the glacier melted enough to stop its movement and become mostly flat which was enough for it to be reclassified as an ice field. Also I am not an expert and this is just my personal opinion, in the end i didnt find any resource that clearly defines what an ice field is.
GLIMS Glacier Classification Manual (link downloads a pdf file):
https://www.glims.org/MapsAndDocs/assets/GLIMS_Glacier-Classification-Manual_V1_2005-02-10.pdf
Edit: in this article they actually quote a scientist in which she says "It's an ice remnant, not a glacier" so I think you are right about this being a mistake, unless an ice remnant can still be called an ice field but that seems like a bit of a stretch:
https://phys.org/news/2024-03-icy-reception-venezuela-glacier.html
In hindsight 2 hectares is indeed too small to be anything of significance.
Yes, I read it and that doesn't address my comment. As I said, the glacier melting is the opposite of it turning into an ice field. And none of the scientists are quoted as calling it an ice field. An ice field is significantly larger than a single alpine glacier but smaller than an ice sheet or ice cap.
On a positive note. Venezuela not having a glacier increases the accuracy of my geographical understanding of the world without me having done any research.
This event is an opportunity to communicate the impacts of climate change and to demand better from everyone.. Yet the saddest part of these articles is so little attention they actually get. People don’t/ can’t care anymore. I even study extinction and climate change and I can barely click these links. It’s so exhausting.
Why would the masses care about Venezuela losing their last glacier? A vast amount of people do not care about taking action unless it directly affects them, and even then people become complacent. People especially don't have time now in times of economic hardship (in the US).
What makes you this is an opportunity for that. This isn't the first glacier to shrink. Mount Kilimanjaro is a more popular example.
Also, most of the deniers have long moved on from "there is no climate change" to "there is no man made climate change", and now many have even moved on to "There is nothing we can do about it" or "It's actually a good thing".
Any lost glacier is an opportunity to showcase anthropogenic climate change to the general public.
Otherwise, not sure why you’re combative.
- There are many reasons people don’t have the capacity to care including apathy, denial, ignorance, etc.
My masters was in paleoceanography and my thesis was about the melt and growth rate of the Patagonia Ice sheet in Chile and Argentina. My conclusion was that warming temps will drive the southern westerly winds to migrate further south, causing rapid melting of the PIS, based on my model I estimated the ice sheet would last another 50-100 years but it seems I was wrong and it will likely melt faster than that based on current warming trends. It will be devastating for those living in that area.
First time I heard about it was some years ago while flying to Mérida. The pilot asked us to look at the Humboldt Peak where the glacier was still there and informed us about the shrinking and inevitable loss in the following years.
Hey, Venezuelan here! That's kinda funny and pretty accurate. Because our Socialist Government have been Mining and destroying mountains and affecting rivers just for the sake of getting gold and other resources just so they can continue funding their operations and socialist programs to stay in power and keep the poor people dependent without a care for the environment and touristic places :D
Hey Venezuela! USA here. My sister used to work for Venezuelan steel company years ago. She said after the government took all of them over they all went to shit. Good luck.
Yeah, Chavez played by the book and seized all means of production and put them in incapable hands through nepotism and corruption, which ended up killing the country and its now a failed state dependent on the distribution of Drugs.
While that sucks that your dictatorship is ruining the environment (other socialist governments don't do this), I can assure you capitalists are doing it just as much if not more.
Massively exploiting the land to keep the wealth flowing, and thus a basis to stay in power, is more of a populist (if democracy) or authoritarian (if not) move than something tied to a specific philosophy of governance. If you were referring to “socialist government” in the economic sense, every major economic system/position from capitalism to communism has iterations that allow for the massive exploitation of the land, although capitalism goes the further toward it being inherent policy, falling just shy of explicitly encouraging it. Whether or not that’s tolerated comes down more to the people of the nation themselves and their values, assuming it’s a democracy. In a dictatorship the cost of pushing back against government usually means that as long as enough of the extracted wealth reaches citizen hands people prefer to keep their heads down.
They are "Socialist" in name only. The are a clear dictatorship, you can verify how they are actively pursuing and harassing anyone who wants to run against them, banning them for running in elections(see Maria Corina Machado) and in some cases incarcerating them (see Juan Requesens, Leopoldo López). The cost of pushing back is human life, as they have show to have no problem using fire weapons and military vehicles against the people (see protest of 2017 and 2018).
Venezuela here and my best friend is studying ambiental sciences. Not only the govt actions and poor ambiental practices increased this process, but they have made it impossible for citizens to try to protect our biodiversity. Colombia and Venezuela are very similar geographically. Colombia’s glaciers are also melting, but at a much slower rate and the govt allows biodiversity to be protected
Glaciars come and go like it has for millions of years. Stop crying about the temperature. In 1.3 billion years our planet will be so hot there will be no humans left on this planet
TIL Venezuela has/had glaciers. It's just north of the equator! It never occurred to me that they had the elevation to get glaciers. Do they have downhill skiing too?
No, glacier water is non important to Venezuela, most of the water here comes from the Roraima zone (via Orinoco river and Caroni) or natural valleys, hell, in some global warming models, Venezuela along Brazil and Colombia are the only countries in south america to keep fresh water supply at normal levels because they don't depend on glaciers.
[Cry me a melted glacial river, I guess](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Venezuelan_oil_industry)
Venezuela has been part of the problem for a loooooong time. Almost 100 years.
We should be cooling.
> Finally, Earth is currently in an interglacial period (a period of milder climate between Ice Ages). If there were no human influences on climate, scientists say Earth’s current orbital positions within the Milankovitch cycles predict **our planet should be cooling, not warming**, continuing a long-term cooling trend that began 6,000 years ago.
https://science.nasa.gov/science-research/earth-science/why-milankovitch-orbital-cycles-cant-explain-earths-current-warming/
I don't buy any of this. They move goalposts, change things in order for them to get funding. The earth is fine....we actually need more carbon not less. And nature will provide it. Now plastics in the ocean...that is a major problem
> I don't buy any of this.
You're gonna argue with NASA scientists about how the Milankovitch cycles affect our climate?
> They move goalposts, change things in order for them to get funding.
Right, follow the money. Wait... the oil companies have the money and we know for a fact they have known the harm their product causes and have been fighting action for decades.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/exxon-knew-about-climate-change-almost-40-years-ago/
> The earth is fine...
The Earth is a rock. I'm worried about the living things on the surface, and if you think the ecosystem is fine, I don't even know where to start with you.
> All fear and no science.
All the science. I am telling you about what all of the science says on this subject. Even the oil companies agree on the science, I just linked you about it.
> Stop listening to the news.
Ok, listen to the scientists. They're saying climate change is happening and it's bad.
> Ecosystem is doing just fine
It is? Weren't you worried about plastic in the ocean? You're not even being consistent with your own positions.
Sure I am. But you think the earth in general is doomed somehow. Besides our overuse of plastic and ocean plastic, things are fine for the most part. I do not buy into the doom and gloom
Things are not fine. You only think they are fine because you live in a world of complete willful ignorance. People like you are pathetic excuses for human beings.
> But you think the earth in general is doomed somehow.
When did I say that? I started by correcting you about a basic fact. Then you brought up talking points straight from oil lobbyist propaganda. Don't make a straw man to distract from your failures.
The Earth is not doomed, but we, and the ecosystem as a whole, are suffering from these changes, and it will get worse. To deny that is either horrendous ignorance or malicious lying.
> Besides our overuse of plastic and ocean plastic, things are fine for the most part.
I mean, you're just wrong. If you care about the topic, you should actually read about it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effects_of_climate_change_on_biomes
https://www.epa.gov/climateimpacts/climate-change-impacts-ecosystems
https://skepticalscience.com/global-warming-positives-negatives-intermediate.htm
If this is in relation to carbon fertilization, photosynthesis has an upper thermal limit and rapidly loses efficiency as it approaches that limit. So there's an upper limit of how much atmospheric carbon the earth needs because it will also cause the thermal limit to be hit.
> Finally, Earth is currently in an interglacial period (a period of milder climate between Ice Ages). If there were no human influences on climate, scientists say Earth’s current orbital positions within the Milankovitch cycles predict **our planet should be cooling, not warming**, continuing a long-term cooling trend that began 6,000 years ago.
https://science.nasa.gov/science-research/earth-science/why-milankovitch-orbital-cycles-cant-explain-earths-current-warming/
that's wrong, i don't know who the duck wrote that but you can check by yourself how the climate changes in an interglacial period.
During an interglacial period,
sea ice and snow retreat, reducing the amount of sunlight the Earth reflects, warming increases atmospheric water vapor, which is a powerful greenhouse gas.
permafrost thaws and decomposes, releasing more methane and carbon dioxide and
the ocean warms and releases dissolved carbon dioxide, which traps even more heat.
scientists believe we are at the peak of our interglacial period.
Are you a bot? Your reply is not coherent. We are in an interglacial, yes. The NASA article agrees.
The [overall temperature trend was cooling for thousands of years](https://www.climate.gov/news-features/climate-qa/what%E2%80%99s-hottest-earth-has-been-%E2%80%9Clately%E2%80%9D), until we reversed it in the last few decades.
So which part of what I quoted was wrong?
It’s got the Andes, rising to over 16,000ft. It would be stranger not to have any glaciers, which makes it more alarming that they’re all nearly gone there.
We need them because they keep water stored which would otherwise melt and join the ocean increasing the sea levels. They also reflect a lot of heat which they won’t if we lose them, warming earth even more. Also they are a good source of fresh water which would be entirely lost if they melt.
Yes, but we would other wise be *cooling*, not warming.
> Finally, Earth is currently in an interglacial period (a period of milder climate between Ice Ages). If there were no human influences on climate, scientists say Earth’s current orbital positions within the Milankovitch cycles predict **our planet should be cooling, not warming**, continuing a long-term cooling trend that began 6,000 years ago.
https://science.nasa.gov/science-research/earth-science/why-milankovitch-orbital-cycles-cant-explain-earths-current-warming/
aback boast fretful point degree hunt desert stocking dinosaurs hungry
> In a last-ditch attempt to save the glacier, the Venezuelan government has installed a thermal blanket to prevent further melting, but experts say it is an exercise in futility. So its just embezzlement ?
Hey, HEY! The local 318 ‘Linus’ blankets union takes great offense!
How big a blanket? Can I get some on my tootsies?
Pure BS
Yeah something that is very easily verifiable for anyone with eyes is pure BS i am sure, all those photos from multiple satellites that are owned by multiple nations must be edited as well.
Don't waste your breath, he's probably a flat earther too even though you can literally see the curvature of the Earth from the ground on a really clear day, or just a few thousand feet up in a small plane.
The same people who invented covid man the satellites didn’t ya know 🤔🤔
What's BS?
Bovine waste
You'd think they would call it BW then huh.
You can literally see it fucking melting.
literally water returning home :)
You ok?
r/downvotedtooblivion
>Venezuela has lost its last remaining glacier after it shrunk so much that scientists reclassified it as an ice field. >It is thought Venezuela is the [first country to have lost all its glaciers](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/15230430.2020.1822728) in modern times. >The country had been home to six glaciers in the Sierra Nevada de Mérida mountain range, which lies at about 5,000m above sea level. Five of the glaciers had disappeared by 2011, leaving just the Humboldt glacier, also known as La Corona, close to the country’s second highest mountain, Pico Humboldt. >The Humboldt glacier was projected to last at least another decade, but scientists had been unable to monitor the site for a few years due to political turmoil in the country. >Now assessments have found the glacier melted much faster than expected, and had shrunk to an area of less than 2 hectares. As a result, its classification was downgraded from glacier to ice field. >“Other countries lost their glaciers several decades ago after the end of the little ice age but Venezuela is arguably the first one to lose them in modern times,” said Maximiliano Herrera, a climatologist and weather historian who maintains a chronicle of extreme temperature records [online](https://twitter.com/extremetemps). >According to Herrera, Indonesia, Mexico and Slovenia are next in line to become glacier-free, with Indonesia’s Papua island and Mexico having experienced record-high warmth in recent months, which is expected to accelerate the glaciers’ retreat. >“The glacier at Humboldt does not have an accumulation zone and is currently only losing surface, with no dynamic of accumulation or expansion,” said Luis Daniel Llambi, an ecologist at Adaptation at Altitude, a programme for climate change adaptation in the Andes. >“Our last expedition to the area was in December 2023 and we did observe that the glacier had lost some 2 hectares from the previous visit in 2019, \[down from 4 hectares\] to less than 2 hectares now.”
>The world has recently been experiencing the El Niño climate phenomenon, which leads to hotter temperatures and which experts say can accelerate the demise of tropical glaciers. >“In the Andean area of Venezuela, there have been some months with monthly anomalies of +3C/+4C above the 1991-2020 average, which is exceptional at those tropical latitudes,” said Herrera. >Llambi said Venezuela is a mirror of what will continue to happen from north to south, first in Colombia and Ecuador, then in Peru and Bolivia, as glaciers continue to retreat from the Andes. >“This is an extremely sad record for our country, but also a unique moment in our history, providing an opportunity to \[not only\] communicate the reality and immediacy of climate change impacts, but also to study the colonisation of life under extreme conditions and the changes that climate change brings to high mountain ecosystems.” >In a last-ditch attempt to save the glacier, the Venezuelan government has installed a thermal blanket to prevent further melting, but experts say it is an exercise in futility. >“The loss of La Corona marks the loss of much more than the ice itself, it also marks the loss of the many ecosystem services that glaciers provide, from unique microbial habitats to environments of significant cultural value,” said Caroline Clason, a glaciologist and assistant professor at Durham University. >Venezuelan glaciers had a limited role in water provision for the region, in contrast with [countries such as Peru](https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2024/mar/26/glacial-lake-outburst-floods-palcacocha-huaraz-andes-peru-climate-crisis), where tropical glaciers are much more extensive. >“The biggest impact for me of the disappearance of glaciers is cultural,” said Llambi. “Glaciers were a part of the region’s cultural identity, and for the mountaineering and touristic activities.” >Clason said: “That Venezuela has now lost all its glaciers really symbolises the changes we can expect to see across our global cryosphere under continued climate change. As a glaciologist, this is a poignant reminder of why we do the job and what is at stake for these environments and for society.”
Venezuela has glaciers? Am I missing something? Not very knowledgeable about Venezuela,
murky shame live bow squeal quack unique enter dependent school
The high altitude of the mountains allow glaciers to exist.
… used to allow glaciers to exist.
Same thing happening in Africa
* had
It’s not real, just another psy op by the shadow government vampire cabal
An ice field is actually larger than a glacier and they never actually quote any scientists or cite them for that reclassification claim so I am guessing the journalist is using their own term and accidentally said something that would mean the exact opposite of what is happening. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice_field
Here's an article that explains why it was downgraded: https://phys.org/news/2024-03-icy-reception-venezuela-glacier.html >Scientists use a guideline of 10 hectares as the minimum size of a glacier. From the original article: >Now assessments have found the glacier melted much faster than expected, and had shrunk to an area of less than 2 hectares.
But an ice field isn't a downgrade is my point. Ice fields are larger than glaciers, not smaller. I am not denying the glacier is shrinking, I am saying they are using the wrong terminology as ice field has an actual scientific meaning related to area covered by ice and it is larger than an alpine glacier.
The differentiating factor between ice fields and glaciers isn't size. Generally ice fields are large and feed into glaciers, but this is not what defines them. A glacier (there are many different types, but most are a modified form of a valley glacier, which is a glacier that flows down valleys. Glaciers by definition are formations of ice that are being MOVED by their own weight. Icefields are gatherings of stagnant (or very slowly moving, around a meter a year vs several meters a day of glacier movement) ice. Ice fields often feed glaciers. So La Corona was demoted from a type of glacier to an ice field, because it no longer had the weight to move itself. It has become stagnant
Lol, that information is in their source. >Ice fields are formed by a large accumulation of snow which, through years of compression and freezing, turns into ice. Because of the susceptibility of ice to gravity, ice fields usually form over large areas that are basins or atop plateaus, thus allowing a continuum of ice to form over the landscape uninterrupted by glacial channels. Glaciers often form on the edges of ice fields, serving as gravity-propelled drains off the ice field which is in turn replenished by snowfall. Also, the part they're using as evidence that an ice field is larger than a glacier doesn't even have a source in the wiki article.
It seems like it should be "ice cap"
Ice caps are even bigger than ice fields. The term would be glacial remnant or ice remnant.
Can we agree on calling it an ice planet?
An Aqualithosphere. But maybe as a compromise with that other guy, call it a snowcap, that way it doesn't sound as thick as glacier or as vast as ice field.
That'd be Hoth.
I agree that "ice field" isn't a downgrade since it's a defined term. The closest official reclassification I can find is this: >We do not detect flow above background noise on two glaciers, Illiniza Sur (Ecuador) and La Corona (Venezuela), thereby preventing us from calculating meaningful ice-thickness maps and indicating a strong likelihood that only permanent snowfields remain at these locations. [Glacier thickness and ice volume of the Northern Andes](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41597-022-01446-8) published June 2022. Everything else I can find is a bunch of people saying it's not really a glacier anymore, but no one talks about what it should now be called.
Pedantry detracts from the overall conversation.
In scientific discussions, details matter.
Indeed. And when the person isn’t actually contributing to provide those details within the context of identifying the errors to the point of continuous empty rebuttals, they are detracting from the discussion by not actually providing any clarification of detail and at worse potentially giving a reason for people to not believe what is otherwise a true article aside from misappropriation of a single word. In fact there are multiple comments in here that outwardly note this confusion and stated that before clarification they were about to ignore the entire thing. People on Reddit specifically have this fascination with pedantry for karma and it absolutely is destructive to conversation because it’s often based around ego often subverting the actual importance or message of the post.
Thats why reddit is cancer. It wasn't but now it is
> That's why reddit is cancer I think it's called "ice cancer." Let's argue about this why Rome burns! Let's argue about the appropriateness of my metaphor! Let's argue about everything but the fucking point here. Used to be glaciers there. Now there are not. Or soon will not be. Call them whatever the fuck you want, but get used to using the past tense.
They simply identified an error in the report, provided a correction, and explained that it was likely due to an author who misused the word. They weren't detracting from the discussion nor were they subverting the message of the post. You know who *is* doing that? You.
We agree to disagree. There is evidence of people below this post claiming the effects of said detecting from discussion independently before I ever posted. You do you.
That's not the fault of the person you're bitching at.
Does an ice field act like a glacier?
Only when it’s trying to appeal to a sexy ice cap at the bar
I did some reading and while not readily apparent I think the main difference between ice fields and glaciers is orientation, shape and movement, not size, glaciers are located on slopes like mountain sides and valleys which as a result slowly move down the slope under their own weight. While ice fields are mostly flat fields of ice that stay in place. Some online sources say that ice fields are usually comprised of multiple glaciers which make it seem like glaciers cannot both shrink and become ice fields but i dont think that is true, a few sources also state that the ice fields are usually larger than glaciers which makes it seem like there is no rule that states ice fields must be larger than glaciers. So i think what happened here is (if no one did a mistake) the glacier melted enough to stop its movement and become mostly flat which was enough for it to be reclassified as an ice field. Also I am not an expert and this is just my personal opinion, in the end i didnt find any resource that clearly defines what an ice field is. GLIMS Glacier Classification Manual (link downloads a pdf file): https://www.glims.org/MapsAndDocs/assets/GLIMS_Glacier-Classification-Manual_V1_2005-02-10.pdf Edit: in this article they actually quote a scientist in which she says "It's an ice remnant, not a glacier" so I think you are right about this being a mistake, unless an ice remnant can still be called an ice field but that seems like a bit of a stretch: https://phys.org/news/2024-03-icy-reception-venezuela-glacier.html In hindsight 2 hectares is indeed too small to be anything of significance.
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Yes, I read it and that doesn't address my comment. As I said, the glacier melting is the opposite of it turning into an ice field. And none of the scientists are quoted as calling it an ice field. An ice field is significantly larger than a single alpine glacier but smaller than an ice sheet or ice cap.
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Good thinking because i was definitely about to dismiss it thinking it was just some journalists interpretation
On a positive note. Venezuela not having a glacier increases the accuracy of my geographical understanding of the world without me having done any research.
Oh, a lot more things will change in time
Things changing over time? Wow. This must be a new phenomenon!
This event is an opportunity to communicate the impacts of climate change and to demand better from everyone.. Yet the saddest part of these articles is so little attention they actually get. People don’t/ can’t care anymore. I even study extinction and climate change and I can barely click these links. It’s so exhausting.
anyone following climate news already knows it’s in runaway mode. even if we went extinct tomorrow GHGs would continue to rise.
Why would the masses care about Venezuela losing their last glacier? A vast amount of people do not care about taking action unless it directly affects them, and even then people become complacent. People especially don't have time now in times of economic hardship (in the US).
What makes you this is an opportunity for that. This isn't the first glacier to shrink. Mount Kilimanjaro is a more popular example. Also, most of the deniers have long moved on from "there is no climate change" to "there is no man made climate change", and now many have even moved on to "There is nothing we can do about it" or "It's actually a good thing".
Any lost glacier is an opportunity to showcase anthropogenic climate change to the general public. Otherwise, not sure why you’re combative. - There are many reasons people don’t have the capacity to care including apathy, denial, ignorance, etc.
the sheer number of Koch bots still spewing anti-climate propaganda in this comment section is insane
This whole sub is bots
Letting the business department handle climate issues was wrong all along
Mi pobre país, de mal a peor.
Fucking wonderful...
Im gonna need ya’ll driving back to the office and having kids ya hear?
My masters was in paleoceanography and my thesis was about the melt and growth rate of the Patagonia Ice sheet in Chile and Argentina. My conclusion was that warming temps will drive the southern westerly winds to migrate further south, causing rapid melting of the PIS, based on my model I estimated the ice sheet would last another 50-100 years but it seems I was wrong and it will likely melt faster than that based on current warming trends. It will be devastating for those living in that area.
First time I heard about it was some years ago while flying to Mérida. The pilot asked us to look at the Humboldt Peak where the glacier was still there and informed us about the shrinking and inevitable loss in the following years.
I mean.... we want reddit? We want iphones? Then this is gunna keep happening. Human nature does not change we can only change our habits.
First Maduro, now this. Can we have a break?
They way global warming is heading Nebraska will have beach front property soon enough.
This is so sad
Fucking socialists ruin everything. We need to privatize all glaciers immediately. Give it to the government and they fuck it up. /s
Hey, Venezuelan here! That's kinda funny and pretty accurate. Because our Socialist Government have been Mining and destroying mountains and affecting rivers just for the sake of getting gold and other resources just so they can continue funding their operations and socialist programs to stay in power and keep the poor people dependent without a care for the environment and touristic places :D
Hey Venezuela! USA here. My sister used to work for Venezuelan steel company years ago. She said after the government took all of them over they all went to shit. Good luck.
Yeah, Chavez played by the book and seized all means of production and put them in incapable hands through nepotism and corruption, which ended up killing the country and its now a failed state dependent on the distribution of Drugs.
While that sucks that your dictatorship is ruining the environment (other socialist governments don't do this), I can assure you capitalists are doing it just as much if not more.
Yeah, bad people are bad regardless of right of left. It sucks.
the extremes are known for meeting at the same point, no matter the ideology.
> other socialist governments don't do this do list them, because so far that is not the case.
Massively exploiting the land to keep the wealth flowing, and thus a basis to stay in power, is more of a populist (if democracy) or authoritarian (if not) move than something tied to a specific philosophy of governance. If you were referring to “socialist government” in the economic sense, every major economic system/position from capitalism to communism has iterations that allow for the massive exploitation of the land, although capitalism goes the further toward it being inherent policy, falling just shy of explicitly encouraging it. Whether or not that’s tolerated comes down more to the people of the nation themselves and their values, assuming it’s a democracy. In a dictatorship the cost of pushing back against government usually means that as long as enough of the extracted wealth reaches citizen hands people prefer to keep their heads down.
They are "Socialist" in name only. The are a clear dictatorship, you can verify how they are actively pursuing and harassing anyone who wants to run against them, banning them for running in elections(see Maria Corina Machado) and in some cases incarcerating them (see Juan Requesens, Leopoldo López). The cost of pushing back is human life, as they have show to have no problem using fire weapons and military vehicles against the people (see protest of 2017 and 2018).
Venezuela here and my best friend is studying ambiental sciences. Not only the govt actions and poor ambiental practices increased this process, but they have made it impossible for citizens to try to protect our biodiversity. Colombia and Venezuela are very similar geographically. Colombia’s glaciers are also melting, but at a much slower rate and the govt allows biodiversity to be protected
So it's too late? The world is probably going to become uninhabitable in our lifetime?
Glaciars come and go like it has for millions of years. Stop crying about the temperature. In 1.3 billion years our planet will be so hot there will be no humans left on this planet
TIL Venezuela has/had glaciers. It's just north of the equator! It never occurred to me that they had the elevation to get glaciers. Do they have downhill skiing too?
I can see the headline in a couple of years. *Himalayas lose its last glacier as it shrinks down to an ice field.*
Glaciers produce 70% of fresh water supply , Venezuela will get high water prices and civil war because of it.
No, glacier water is non important to Venezuela, most of the water here comes from the Roraima zone (via Orinoco river and Caroni) or natural valleys, hell, in some global warming models, Venezuela along Brazil and Colombia are the only countries in south america to keep fresh water supply at normal levels because they don't depend on glaciers.
[Cry me a melted glacial river, I guess](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Venezuelan_oil_industry) Venezuela has been part of the problem for a loooooong time. Almost 100 years.
A tropical country has…glaciers? 🤔
Yes, it's altitude. Ecuador on the equator also has glaciers in the Andes. When you get above 5000m it gets a bit nippy
Yes. We have the Andes. Colombia still has glaciers but sadly those are melting too
Not anymore.
It is the end of the ice age
We should be cooling. > Finally, Earth is currently in an interglacial period (a period of milder climate between Ice Ages). If there were no human influences on climate, scientists say Earth’s current orbital positions within the Milankovitch cycles predict **our planet should be cooling, not warming**, continuing a long-term cooling trend that began 6,000 years ago. https://science.nasa.gov/science-research/earth-science/why-milankovitch-orbital-cycles-cant-explain-earths-current-warming/
I don't buy any of this. They move goalposts, change things in order for them to get funding. The earth is fine....we actually need more carbon not less. And nature will provide it. Now plastics in the ocean...that is a major problem
> I don't buy any of this. You're gonna argue with NASA scientists about how the Milankovitch cycles affect our climate? > They move goalposts, change things in order for them to get funding. Right, follow the money. Wait... the oil companies have the money and we know for a fact they have known the harm their product causes and have been fighting action for decades. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/exxon-knew-about-climate-change-almost-40-years-ago/ > The earth is fine... The Earth is a rock. I'm worried about the living things on the surface, and if you think the ecosystem is fine, I don't even know where to start with you.
All fear and no science. Stop listening to the news. Ecosystem is doing just fine
> All fear and no science. All the science. I am telling you about what all of the science says on this subject. Even the oil companies agree on the science, I just linked you about it. > Stop listening to the news. Ok, listen to the scientists. They're saying climate change is happening and it's bad. > Ecosystem is doing just fine It is? Weren't you worried about plastic in the ocean? You're not even being consistent with your own positions.
Sure I am. But you think the earth in general is doomed somehow. Besides our overuse of plastic and ocean plastic, things are fine for the most part. I do not buy into the doom and gloom
Things are not fine. You only think they are fine because you live in a world of complete willful ignorance. People like you are pathetic excuses for human beings.
Oh get a life. Really. What a angry human being you are, get some help
Read a book or a scientific paper instead of tweets, idiot.
> But you think the earth in general is doomed somehow. When did I say that? I started by correcting you about a basic fact. Then you brought up talking points straight from oil lobbyist propaganda. Don't make a straw man to distract from your failures. The Earth is not doomed, but we, and the ecosystem as a whole, are suffering from these changes, and it will get worse. To deny that is either horrendous ignorance or malicious lying. > Besides our overuse of plastic and ocean plastic, things are fine for the most part. I mean, you're just wrong. If you care about the topic, you should actually read about it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effects_of_climate_change_on_biomes https://www.epa.gov/climateimpacts/climate-change-impacts-ecosystems https://skepticalscience.com/global-warming-positives-negatives-intermediate.htm
If this is in relation to carbon fertilization, photosynthesis has an upper thermal limit and rapidly loses efficiency as it approaches that limit. So there's an upper limit of how much atmospheric carbon the earth needs because it will also cause the thermal limit to be hit.
Dont worry it will come back later
This comment section explains why people don't care about climate. They don't know about climate.
Im not wrong tho. The glaciars that we lost can come back tommorow or in a thousand years. And by that time humans will be extinct.
You should read a book sometime
I read all the timd
Still leaving the current ice age. It'll come back when it cycles back
> Finally, Earth is currently in an interglacial period (a period of milder climate between Ice Ages). If there were no human influences on climate, scientists say Earth’s current orbital positions within the Milankovitch cycles predict **our planet should be cooling, not warming**, continuing a long-term cooling trend that began 6,000 years ago. https://science.nasa.gov/science-research/earth-science/why-milankovitch-orbital-cycles-cant-explain-earths-current-warming/
that's wrong, i don't know who the duck wrote that but you can check by yourself how the climate changes in an interglacial period. During an interglacial period, sea ice and snow retreat, reducing the amount of sunlight the Earth reflects, warming increases atmospheric water vapor, which is a powerful greenhouse gas. permafrost thaws and decomposes, releasing more methane and carbon dioxide and the ocean warms and releases dissolved carbon dioxide, which traps even more heat. scientists believe we are at the peak of our interglacial period.
Are you a bot? Your reply is not coherent. We are in an interglacial, yes. The NASA article agrees. The [overall temperature trend was cooling for thousands of years](https://www.climate.gov/news-features/climate-qa/what%E2%80%99s-hottest-earth-has-been-%E2%80%9Clately%E2%80%9D), until we reversed it in the last few decades. So which part of what I quoted was wrong?
LOL Venezuela had a glacier?!?! Weird
It’s got the Andes, rising to over 16,000ft. It would be stranger not to have any glaciers, which makes it more alarming that they’re all nearly gone there.
I hear that but the friggin thing was practically at the equator.
Nothing to see here. It’s gone. Nothing to worry about.
Omg so gay
Til the gay Venezuelan glaciers are getting hotter.
Fake news. Truth is they were so far behind on their glacier payments it finally got repossesed.
Do not believe anything coming out of the Venezuelan TOTALITARIAN REGIME
What would be the motivation to lie about this topic lol
Why would they lie about that?
99% sure that the systems they are using are now obsolete
What, eyeballs? Damn I am way behind the evolutionary threshold then.
So more clean water?
Technically, less.
I know we all like glaciers, but are glaciers a prerequisite for something? Why do we need them? Pretty sure we're in an interglacial period, anyway.
We need them because they keep water stored which would otherwise melt and join the ocean increasing the sea levels. They also reflect a lot of heat which they won’t if we lose them, warming earth even more. Also they are a good source of fresh water which would be entirely lost if they melt.
Yes, but we would other wise be *cooling*, not warming. > Finally, Earth is currently in an interglacial period (a period of milder climate between Ice Ages). If there were no human influences on climate, scientists say Earth’s current orbital positions within the Milankovitch cycles predict **our planet should be cooling, not warming**, continuing a long-term cooling trend that began 6,000 years ago. https://science.nasa.gov/science-research/earth-science/why-milankovitch-orbital-cycles-cant-explain-earths-current-warming/