Subscribe now

Environment

Antarctica is in crisis and we are scrambling to understand its future

The last two years have seen unprecedented falls in the levels of sea ice around Antarctica, which serves as a protective wall for the continent's huge ice sheets. Researchers are now racing to understand the global impact of what could happen next

By James Woodford

2 December 2024

Drilling for ice cores helps reveal the health of the Antarctic

Nerilie Abram

If all our fear and uncertainty over climate change could be distilled into a single statistic, then arguably it was delivered to an emergency summit on the future of the Antarctic last month.

Nerilie Abram at the Australian National University, Canberra, opened her presentation with a slide headlined “Antarctic sea ice has declined precipitously since 2014, and in July 2023 exceeded a minus 7 sigma event”.

At times, the noise of…

Sign up to our weekly newsletter

Receive a weekly dose of discovery in your inbox! We'll also keep you up to date with New Scientist events and special offers.

Sign up

To continue reading, subscribe today with our introductory offers