Climate Change

There Aren't A Lot Of Glaciers Left In Glacier National Park

Global warming has had a huge negative impact on Glacier National Park's glaciers.

There Aren't A Lot Of Glaciers Left In Glacier National Park
U.S. Geological Survey
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Glacier National Park is rapidly losing its namesakes.

In the past 50 years, glaciers in the park have shrunk by 39 percent on average, though some have lost as much as 85 percent of their mass.

And the U.S. Geological Survey says only 26 of the parks original 150 glaciers are large enough to actually be called glaciers. 

The massive melt-off isn't too surprising. Global warming is melting glaciers the world over. 

The Environmental Protection Agency says glaciers worldwide have been losing mass since at least the 1970s, but evidence suggests the melting could've started around the 1940s.

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And NASA says that worldwide, glaciers shed nearly 400 billion tons of ice a year and have been doing so since at least 1994.

In the last century, sea levels have gone up by an average of 6 inches because of ice melt.

But Montana is in danger of losing its glaciers faster than the rest of the world. Western Montana — where Glacier National Park is located — is warming almost twice as fast as the global average. 

The glaciers in the park are thousands of years old, but if current trends continue, it could lose all of its active glaciers by 2030.