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Deep in California’s Sierra Nevada, massive glaciers are vanishing and projected to dissolve entirely by the start of the coming hundred years, leaving summits without glaciers for the first time in recorded human existence, new research has discovered.

Ancient Beginnings of Sierra Range Ice Masses

The range's ice sheets are more ancient than previously known, tracing back many thousands of years, with a few as old as the most recent glacial period, according to a report published last week.

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

Worldwide Risk to Ice Formations

Ice masses around the world are under threat amid the climate crisis. A study released in May of the current year found that almost forty percent of glaciers are doomed to thaw because of global heating. If this warming rises by 2.7C, which the planet is currently on track for, as up to seventy-five percent will vanish, causing sea level rise and mass displacement.

Across the Western United States, glaciers have shrunk substantially since they were initially recorded in the 1800s, according to the report.

Concentration on Major Glaciers

The recent study focuses on four Sierra Nevada glacial masses – the Palisade, Lyell, Maclure and Conness glaciers – that are some of the biggest and likely oldest in the mountain chain. Their longevity during global heating makes them “indicators” for studying ice loss in the west, the article notes.

Research Methods and Results

Scientists examined recently exposed base rock around the ice formations and took samples to ascertain how extensively the region was covered by ice. They found that the glaciers have covered large areas of the range for much longer than previously known – since prior to people occupied North America.

The state's glacial sheets attained their peak extents as long ago as thirty thousand years ago, the study's researchers wrote, and a particular of the ice bodies experts studied is believed to have expanded seven thousand years ago, earlier than once thought. The disappearance of glaciers, for the first time in recorded history, shows the dramatic impacts of the climate crisis, a researcher of the study said.

Environmental and Representational Impact

“We’ll be the initial ones to witness the ice-free peaks,” said Andrew Jones, the study’s lead author. “This has environmental implications for plants and animals. And it’s a representational decline. Global warming is very abstract, but these glaciers are tangible. They’re symbolic elements of the American West.”