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Deep in California’s Sierra Nevada, enormous ice formations are vanishing and projected to melt away entirely by the start of the coming hundred years, resulting in summits without glaciers for the first time in human history, new research has discovered.

Age-Old Origins of Sierra Range Glaciers

The mountain range’s ice sheets are more ancient than previously known, dating back tens of thousands of years, with some as ancient as the most recent glacial period, according to an article released recently.

“Our reconstructed glacial history shows that a future ice-free Sierra Nevada is without precedent in human history since known settlement of the Americas around twenty thousand years ago,” the study states.

Global Risk to Glaciers

Ice masses globally are under threat during the climate emergency. A study published in the month of May of the current year found that almost forty percent of ice sheets are doomed to melt because of global heating. If such heating increases by 2.7C, which the planet is presently on course for, as many as 75% will vanish, leading to sea level rise and large-scale relocation.

Throughout the American west, ice formations have diminished significantly since they were initially recorded in the 1800s, according to the report.

Concentration on Major Ice Bodies

The new research focuses on four Sierra Nevada glacial masses – the Palisade, Lyell, Maclure and Conness ice sheets – that are among the biggest and probably oldest in the mountain chain. Their longevity during global heating makes them “indicators” for studying glacier disappearance in the west, the study notes.

Study Techniques and Findings

Researchers examined newly uncovered bedrock around the glaciers and took samples to ascertain how extensively the area was covered by ice. They determined that the glaciers have covered large areas of the range for much longer than earlier believed – since prior to people occupied North America.

California’s glacial sheets reached their peak extents as early as thirty thousand years ago, the study's researchers wrote, and a particular of the ice bodies experts looked at is thought to have expanded 7,000 years ago, earlier than once thought. The loss of ice formations, for the first time in recorded history, demonstrates the dramatic effects of the climate crisis, one author of the study said.

Ecological and Representational Consequences

“We’ll be the first to witness the glacier-less summits,” said Andrew Jones, the study’s lead author. “This has environmental ramifications for flora and fauna. And it’s a representational decline. Global warming is very abstract, but these glaciers are tangible. They’re iconic features of the Western U.S..”