Radar Data Show Thwaites Gets a Daily Bath of Warm Seawater

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By Anupama Chandrasekaran, Eos/AGU. 

Excerpt: Daily tides bring warm ocean water farther in beneath West Antarctica’s Thwaites Glacier than previously thought, potentially causing ice to melt faster than expected, according to a new study. The finding could help scientists make better predictions about the fate of one of the world’s most closely watched glaciers. Thwaites ...is about the size of Florida. It currently contributes about 4% to global annual sea level rise. ... recent research on Thwaites and other glaciers has shown that these boundaries between floating ice and ice that is grounded on the seafloor shift with the daily tide. ...The team found that the ice rose and sank in sync with the tides. The data suggested that the grounding line migrated up to 6 kilometers (3.7 miles) inland during an average high tide. ...The study was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. ...Their results showed that seawater affects a larger area under glaciers than previously thought.... 

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