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Glaciers in the Southern Alps of New Zealand
Photo: Wirestock / Getty Images
New Zealand's glaciers are shrinking faster than researchers expected. Higher temperatures as a result of climate change are causing the ice masses to melt and the snow line to rise, the National Institute for Water and Atmospheric Research (Niwa) announced on Monday. "In recent years we have seen this increase accelerate, so we are seeing a continued trend of glacier ice loss," said Niwa program manager Andrew Lorrey. New Zealand's breathtaking landscape is about to change fundamentally.
Since the 1970s, experts from the institute have been flying over the country's mountain ranges at the end of summer to measure the snow line and check the condition of the glaciers. "We flew to the southernmost glaciers that we haven't visited since 2018," said Lorrey. Even back then, they were “incredibly small and practically dead.” Now the situation has gotten even worse. One of the glaciers is only two-thirds the size of the last time it was seen. The glaciers appeared “shattered and destroyed.”
Over the past decade, New Zealand has experienced seven of the 10 warmest years on record, it said. 2023 was the second warmest year ever. "Even if there were a few cooler years, they wouldn't be enough to undo the damage already done," Lorrey explained.
Glaciers are an important part of New Zealand's environment, economy and culture. They are also an important source of meltwater that supplies lakes, rivers and oceans with nutrients. "New Zealand is one of the few places in the mid-latitudes where people live near glaciers and they can be easily seen and visited," Lorrey said.
In the meantime, tourism companies would have to penetrate further and further into the mountains in order to even reach them. The scientist stressed that he fears that the next generation will no longer experience New Zealand's glaciers.
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