Alpine Glaciers Melting: Urgent Climate Action Needed

 The Dolomites' crowning glory, the Marmolada glacier, is swiftly diminishing. Stark images of the Marmolada mountain range expose the affliction of the Alps, with the heat becoming intolerable even at significant altitudes. In an unprecedented event, the Punta Penia station recorded a distressing temperature of 13.3°C at an altitude of 3343 meters - the highest value in a decade. Furthermore, all Alpine glaciers now exceed the thermal zero, with the temperature reaching 5,328 meters on August 21.

To avert catastrophes like the avalanche last summer, which claimed 11 lives, the Civil Defense now conducts daily surveillance flyovers of the Marmolada. Its glacier is on the brink of extinction due to global warming.

The situation is similar for other glaciers across the nation as they succumb to the climate crisis. A joint expedition by Greenpeace Italy and the Italian Glaciological Committee (CGI) to the Forni Glacier in the Stelvio National Park paints a grim picture. The Forni glacier's melting rate has amplified by 50 percent compared to 2022. In the glacial tongue's lower area, recent measurements have reported a loss of 37 centimeters of ice thickness in just four days, considerably higher than the average daily loss of 6 centimeters.

Since the 1800s, the Forni Glacier has lost approximately 10 square kilometers or half of its surface area, with the glacier front receding 400 meters in less than a decade. Forecasts based on climate scenarios are bleak: by 2060, up to 80 percent of the surface area of Italian Alpine glaciers will have vanished, leading to significant impacts on meltwater volumes, ecosystem imbalances, and exacerbating downstream drought issues.

The alarm bells are also ringing in Switzerland, where glaciers are severely suffering due to the persistent African heatwave. The country's Federal Office of Meteorology and Climatology confirmed that the zero temperature was recorded at an elevation of 5,298 meters, a record high for the past 70 years. A recent satellite image captured by the European Copernicus program on August 22 starkly reveals the deteriorating health of the Swiss Alps' glaciers.