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Warming Climate Melts Mighty Himalayan Glaciers
FrontLines - February 2010
KATHMANDU, Nepal—
Dawa Steven Sherpa is only 25
but has already climbed Mt.
Everest twice. The last time he
was on top of the Earth’s highest
point, he picked up a small stone
for President Barack Obama.
The stone was given to
Nepal’s prime minister, who
gave it to Obama at the United
Nations in September to symbolize
the growing problem of
global warming, which threatens
the world’s highest mountain
range—the Himalayas.
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This Tibetan Buddhist stupa, or shrine, watches
over the trail from Namche Bazaar towards
Mt. Everest in Nepal’s Khumbu Valley while
strings of prayer flags blow in the wind.
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“Everest is changing,” said
Dawa Steven, as he is called. “A
few years ago, the summit was a
large icy area where 50 people
might fit. Now only 20 can be
there—the cornice [of snow] is
slowly breaking off and more
rock is exposed. It may be global
warming.”
Climate change might also be
affecting his Sherpa village of
Khumjung, where two streams
that used to flow off Everest’s
glaciers have dried up as the glaciers
have retreated. People must
walk for two hours to fetch
water now.
Between 5,000 and 6,000
meters (16,400 and 19,700 feet)
in altitude, the glaciers have disappeared,
said Dawa Steven in
an interview in October, just
prior to leading an expedition of
British Royal Marines up Ama
Dabalam Mountain (22,500 feet)
near Everest.
He is worried about the creation
of many glacial lakes high
in the mountains. Once glaciers
of solid ice 100 feet thick flowed
slowly along, a few feet a year.
In their place there are now lakes
such as Imja Glacial Lake—
more than a mile long and up to
300 feet deep.
These lakes
could burst over
their boundaries
at any moment
due to erosion or
the many earthquakes
that hit
this region. In
1985, one of the
new glacial
lakes burst,
killed 19 people,
and destroyed 30
houses, 14
bridges, and a
hydroelectric
plant.
To show how
dangerous a glacial
lake collapse
might be, on June
18, 2009, marathon
runners took
off from Imja
Lake, at 16,000
feet, to Dawa Steven’s
home village down at 12,400
feet. Fast as the Sherpa runners
raced over the trails, a raging flood
would have beat them.
“We wanted to show that if
Imja Lake burst out, it will not
only kill people and destroy
property but can make an entire
mountain culture disappear in its
aftermath,” wrote Ang Tshering
Sherpa, founder and chairman of
Asian Trekking, the company
Dawa Steven works with.
Asian Trekking has removed
tons of trash from the upper
mountains and seeks solutions to
climate change problems with the
World Wildlife Fund—which
receives USAID funds—and with
the International Center for Integrated
Mountain Development.
The glacial lakes, for example,
might be drained by siphoning
or cutting drainage holes.
Threatened villages could create
shelters uphill from potential
floods. Farmers could also shift
to crops that need less water.
And early warning systems
could be installed to sound the
alert if the lakes collapse.
Dawa Steven recalled that he
was recently stunned to find a
garbage fly at 17,000 feet at
Everest Base Camp. He’d never
seen insects at that altitude
before and thinks it’s another
sign of global warming.
The fate of the Himalayas has
impact far beyond the steep valleys
of Nepal. Water off the
Himalayas flows into the mighty
rivers of Asia—the Ganges, the
Indus, the Brahmaputra, the
Mekong, the Irrawaddy, the
Yangtze, and the Yellow. More
than 2 billion people depend
upon those rivers for life.
★
FrontLines Editorial Director Ben Barber wrote this series of articles following a trip to Nepal in October. All photos by Ben Barber unless otherwise noted.
FrontLines is published
by the Bureau for Legislative and Public Affairs
U.S. Agency for International Development
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