Dozens of people yesterday took part in “funeral march” up a steep Swiss mountainside to mark the disappearance of an Alpine glacier amid growing global alarm over climate change.
The Pizol “has lost so much substance that from a scientific perspective it is no longer a glacier,” said Alessandra Degiacomi, of the Swiss Association for Climate Protection.
The organization said about 100 people made the two-hour “funeral march” up the side of Pizol mountian in northeastern Switzerland to the foot of the steep and rapidly melting ice formation, situated at about 2,700m near the Liechtenstein and Austrian borders.
Photo: Reuters
A chaplain and several scientists gave speeches in remembrance of the glacier, accompanied by the mournful tones of alphorns — a 3.6m pipe-shaped wooden instrument.
A wreath was laid for the Pizol glacier, which has been one of the most studied glaciers in the Alps.
The move comes after Iceland made global headlines last month with a large ceremony and the laying of a bronze plaque to commemorate Okjokull, the nation’s first glacier lost to climate change.
However, unlike Iceland, yesterday’s ceremony did not mark the first disappearance of a glacier from the Swiss Alps.
“Since 1850, we estimate that more than 500 Swiss glaciers have completely disappeared, including 50 that were named,” said Matthias Huss, a glaciologist at the ETH Zurich university.
Pizol might not be the first glacier to vanish in Switzerland, but “you could say it is the first to disappear that has been very thoroughly studied,” Huss said.
The logs kept since scientists began tracking the glacier in 1893 paint a bleak picture of recent rapid changes to the climate.
Pizol has lost 80 to 90 percent of its volume just since 2006, leaving behind just 26,000m2 of ice, or “less than four football fields,” Huss said.
Pizol, which sits at a relatively low altitude, was never very big.
According to Glacier Monitoring Switzerland, it, like nearly 80 percent of Swiss glaciers, has been considered a so-called glacieret.
It has figured among about 4,000 glaciers dotted throughout the Alps, providing seasonal water to millions and forming some of Europe’s most stunning landscapes.
Huss and other ETH scientists recently cautioned that more than 90 percent of the Alpine glaciers could disappear by the end of this century if greenhouse gas emissions are not reined in.
Regardless of what actions humans take now, the Alps will lose at least half of their ice mass by 2100, according to their study, published in April.
In a subsequent study published earlier this month, the researchers said that the Alps’ largest glacier, the Aletsch, could completely disappear over the next eight decades.
‘GROSS NEGLIGENCE?’ Despite a spleen typically being significantly smaller than a liver, the surgeon said he believed Bryan’s spleen was ‘double the size of what is normal’ A Florida surgeon who is facing criminal charges after allegedly removing a patient’s liver instead of his spleen has said he is “forever traumatized” by that person’s death. In a deposition from November last year that was recently obtained by NBC, 44-year-old Thomas Shaknovsky described the death of 70-year-old William Bryan as an “incredibly unfortunate event that I regret deeply.” Bryan died after the botched surgery; and last month, a grand jury in Tallahassee indicted Shaknovsky on a charge of manslaughter. “I’m forever traumatized by it and hurt by it,” Shaknovsky added, also saying that wrong-site surgeries can happen “during
Former Chinese ministers of national defense Wei Fenghe(魏鳳和) and Li Shangfu (李尚福) were both sentenced to death with a two-year reprieve over graft charges, state news agency Xinhua reported on Thursday, underscoring the severity of the purge in the military. The armed forces have been one of the main targets of a broad corruption crackdown ordered by Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) after coming to power in 2012. The purges reached the elite Rocket Force, which oversees nuclear weapons as well as conventional missiles, in 2023. Earlier this year they escalated further, resulting in the removal of the top general in
‘PERSONAL MISTAKES’: Eileen Wang has agreed to plead guilty to the felony, which comes with a maximum sentence of 10 years in federal prison A southern California mayor has agreed to plead guilty to acting as an illegal agent for the Chinese government and has resigned from her city position, officials said on Monday. Eileen Wang (王愛琳), mayor of Arcadia, was charged last month with one count of acting in the US as an illegal agent of a foreign government. She was accused of doing the bidding of Chinese officials, such as sharing articles favorable to Beijing, without prior notification to the US government as required by law. The 58-year-old was elected in November 2022 to a five-person city council, from which the mayor is selected
IN PROTECTION: Video released by the Senate showed Ronald dela Rosa being chased through the halls of the upper chamber, pursued by National Bureau of Investigation officers Philippine authorities on Monday said that they would not arrest for now a lawmaker wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for his alleged role in former Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte’s drug war, capping a lengthy Senate standoff. Philippine Senator Ronald dela Rosa, who served as police chief and Duterte’s top enforcer during the bloody drug crackdown, would be treated as if in the custody of the Senate, National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) Director Melvin Matibag told reporters after the politician had taken refuge in the legislative building. “We respect that they are a co-equal branch,” Matibag said after the Senate refused
RSS