ESA's Cryosat Mission Sees Antarctic Ice Losses Double

An anonymous reader writes in with news that seems to confirm the alarming reports last week about Antarctic ice melting. "The new assessment comes from Europe's Cryosat spacecraft, which has a radar instrument specifically designed to measure the shape of the ice sheet. The melt loss from the White Continent is sufficient to push up global sea levels by around 0.43mm per year. Scientists report the data in the journal Geophysical Research Letters (abstract). The new study incorporates three years of measurements from 2010 to 2013, and updates a synthesis of observations made by other satellites over the period 2005 to 2010. Cryosat has been using its altimeter to trace changes in the height of the ice sheet — as it gains mass through snowfall, and loses mass through melting."

Re:0.43 mm per year, eh?

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey, illiterate, that is simply from one source not the entire source of sea levels rising.

Re:0.43 mm per year, eh?

[WhiteZook]

Actually, this recent study claims that in the years 2005-2011, contribution from melting ice was 3 times as high as thermal expansion of the oceans: http://www.nature.com/ngeo/jou... [nature.com]

Funny thing

[QuantumSam]

The ice sheet may be coming apart up in the whitw continent, but that's where several volcanoes are located. Active volcanoes. As in HOT. As for the rest of Antarctica, the ice is at a 30 year high. Here: chew on some better data http://judithcurry.com/2014/02... [judithcurry.com] http://wattsupwiththat.com/201... [wattsupwiththat.com] http://wp.me/P7y4l-5Kc [wp.me] http://wattsupwiththat.com/201... [wattsupwiththat.com]