TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - The European Space Agency (ESA) reported that one of Antarctic’s largest glaciers, Pine Island, raced up to 100 meters in less than two weeks this month. The shift is typical for the Pine Island glacier which flows 4000 meters toward to ocean each year.
"Pine Island is not speeding up," said Eric Rignot, an expert on Pine Island Glacier at the University of California, Irvine, and NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, as quoted by Live Science.
However, the glacier is one of the most rapidly changing features in West Antarctica. In recent decades, the colossal river of ice has sped up and grown markedly thinner. Studies suggest this change is due to the warm ocean water melting the ice from below.
LIVE SCIENCE | AMRI MAHBUB