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Far in California’s Sierra Nevada, enormous ice formations are vanishing and projected to melt away completely by the beginning of the coming hundred years, leaving summits without glaciers for the first time in recorded human existence, new research has found.

Age-Old Beginnings of Sierra Nevada Ice Masses

The range's ice sheets are more ancient than earlier understood, dating back tens of thousands of years, with some as old as the last ice age, according to a report released last week.

“Our reconstructed glacial history indicates that a future ice-free Sierra Nevada is unprecedented in human history since known peopling of the Americas around twenty thousand years ago,” the study states.

Global Risk to Glaciers

Glaciers globally are at risk amid the climate crisis. A research published in May of this year determined that nearly 40% of glaciers are destined to melt because of global heating. If such heating rises by 2.7C, which the world is presently on track for, as up to 75% will disappear, leading to sea level rise and mass displacement.

Throughout the American west, glaciers have diminished significantly since they were initially recorded in the 1800s, according to the article.

Focus on Key Ice Bodies

The recent study focuses on four Sierra Nevada glacial masses – the Palisade, Lyell, Maclure and Conness glaciers – that are among the largest and probably most ancient in the mountain chain. Their longevity during global heating makes them “indicators” for examining ice loss in the west, the article states.

Research Methods and Findings

Researchers looked at newly uncovered bedrock around the glaciers and took samples to ascertain how long the region was blanketed by glacial ice. They found that the ice masses have covered large areas of the mountain system for far longer than previously known – since prior to humans occupied North America.

The state's glacial sheets reached their maximum positions as early as 30,000 years ago, the study's researchers wrote, and a particular of the glaciers experts looked at is believed to have grown seven thousand years ago, earlier than previously believed. The loss of glaciers, for the initial time in human history, demonstrates the profound impacts of the climate crisis, a researcher of the investigation said.

Ecological and Representational Consequences

“We’ll be the initial ones to see the ice-free peaks,” said Andrew Jones, the study’s lead author. “This has ecological implications for plants and animals. And it’s a representational decline. Climate change is highly intangible, but these glaciers are concrete. They’re symbolic elements of the Western U.S..”