Record Greenland Melt Got Boost from Forest Fires
Without a boost from forest fire ash, warm summer temperatures couldn't have melted nearly all of Greenland's surface ice in 2012, a new study finds.
Soot from raging forest fires in Siberia and North America fell on Greenland's bright white snow and ice in the summer of 2012. Combined with record-high temperatures, the ash kicked the ice sheet's annual summer melt into overdrive, researchers report.
Forest fire soot, also called black carbon, hastens melting, because it darkens Greenland's shimmery white surface, increasing the amount of heat absorbed by the island's surface. It's similar to the difference between wearing a black and white T-shirt on a hot summer day, said lead study author Kaitlin Keegan, a doctoral student at Dartmouth College in New Hampshire.
The massive melt in 2012 was the first time researchers saw stunning blue surface water ponds in the high altitudes of central and northern Greenland (up to 10,000 feet, or 3,100 meters, above sea level). Similar island-wide melting hit a handful of times in the past 1,000 years, ice layers show.
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