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The Antarctic ice sheet is a continental glacier covering 98% of the Antarctic continent, with an area of 14 million square kilometres (5.4 million square miles) and an average thickness of over 2 kilometres (1.2 mi).
The East Antarctic Ice Sheet (EAIS) lies between 45° west and 168° east longitudinally. It was first formed around 34 million years ago, [3] and it is the largest ice sheet on the entire planet, with far greater volume than the Greenland ice sheet or the West Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS), from which it is separated by the Transantarctic Mountains.
Like the other ice sheets, West Antarctic Ice Sheet had undergone significant changes in size during its history. Until around 400,000 years ago, the state of WAIS was largely governed by the effects of solar variation on heat content of the Southern Ocean, and it waxed and waned in accordance with a 41,000-year-long cycle. [31]
Greenland ice sheet as seen from space. An ice sheet is a body of ice which covers a land area of continental size - meaning that it exceeds 50,000 km 2. [4] The currently existing two ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica have a much greater area than this minimum definition, measuring at 1.7 million km 2 and 14 million km 2, respectively.
The eastern portion of Antarctica contains more than five times the ice that is found in the West Antarctic Ice Sheet, the AP reported. If all of the ice in the east was to melt, scientists say ...
The West Antarctic Ice Sheet holds enough water to raise sea levels by about 5 meters – more than 16 feet — which would cause devastating flooding in coastal towns and cities around the world.
The West Antarctic ice sheet is likely to completely melt [95] [96] [97] unless temperatures are reduced by 2 °C (3.6 °F) below 2020 levels. [98] The loss of this ice sheet would take between 2,000 and 13,000 years, [99] [100] although several centuries of high greenhouse emissions could shorten this time to 500 years. [101]
But the region is hugely significant: the Antarctic ice sheet already sheds an average of 150 billion metric tons of ice every year and, in its entirety, it holds enough water to raise global sea ...