To The Center

Almost the entire surface of Greenland’s massive ice sheet is melting at the moment at a level unseen in the last 123 years. Satellite images provided by NASA showed extensive melting, which started on July 8.

Although seasonal melting is normal, the present rate as well as the extent of melting was unprecedented.

“You literally had this wave of warm air wash over the Greenland ice sheet and melt it,” NASA scientist Tom Wagner said, according to the Wall Street Journal.

While some slushy areas appear to be freezing again, an iceberg twice the size of Manhattan broke off from the Petermann Glacier in northern Greenland.

Scientists are shocked by the occurrences, but they cannot agree on the cause of the melting. Some suggested it was a natural though rare event, others speculated it was the result of climate change caused by human activities.

Researchers and climatologists are paying close attention to the Arctic area, where the effects of climate change are most prominent.

“Greenland is losing mass, but it would take a very long time to lose all of that mass,” Thomas Mote, a climatologist at the University of Georgia, was quoted by National Geographic News as saying.

NASA scientists will continue to watch satellite image to find relations between unusual melting phenomena.