A team sponsored by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) has found signs that the landscape of Mount Everest has changed significantly since Sir Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay first conquered the peak in 1953. A primary cause is the warming global climate.
The team found that the glacier that once came close to Hillary and Norgay's first camp has retreated three miles (five kilometers). A series of ponds that used to be near Island Peak—so-called because it was then an island in a sea of ice—had merged into a long lake. |
This lake threatens to flood the village around the mountain.
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Data from 49 meteorological monitoring centers in Nepal indicate that temperatures have been rising about 0.06 degrees Celsius each year since the mid-1970s, with the average temperature now a degree higher.
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" UNEP-ICIMOD study: Data from 49 meteorological monitoring centers in Nepal indicate that temperatures have been rising about 0.06 degrees Celsius each year since the mid-1970s, with the average temperature now a degree higher.
Another lake deemed at critical risk of bursting is Tsho Rolpa in the Dolakha district of Nepal. Half a century ago the lake, which supplies water to the Rolwaling and Tama Koshi Valleys, extended 0.23 square kilometers (0.1 square miles). Today its expanse is 1.4 square kilometers (0.5 square miles).
Flooding from glacial lake outbursts is not new, but evidence points to increased frequency of such events over the past three decades.
In one such incident, the Dig Tsho glacial lake in Nepal overflowed in August 1985, destroying 14 bridges and causing $1.5 million worth of damage to the uncompleted Namche small hydropower plant in the region.
