Science Antarctica gains ice for first time in decades, reversing trend of mass loss, study finds

https://archive.ph/2d4LJ

https://www.livenowfox.com/news/antarctica-ice-sheet-growth

Antarctica gains ice for first time in decades, reversing trend of mass loss, study finds​

By Austin Williams
Published May 2, 2025 5:15pm EDT
Science
FOX Local

article

FILE - Giant tabular icebergs are surrounded by ice floe drift in Vincennes Bay on January 11, 2008 in the Australian Antarctic Territory. (Photo by Torsten Blackwood - Pool/Getty Images)

The Brief​

• • The Antarctic Ice Sheet gained mass between 2021 and 2023, a dramatic reversal from decades of loss.
  • Four key glacier basins in East Antarctica showed significant growth due to increased snowfall.
  • The mass gain briefly contributed to a decrease in global sea level rise, according to satellite data.

A surprising shift is underway at the bottom of the world. After decades of contributing to rising sea levels, Antarctica’s massive ice sheet has started growing again — at least for now.



A study published this week in Science China Earth Sciences finds that the Antarctic Ice Sheet (AIS) experienced a record-breaking mass gain between 2021 and 2023, largely due to anomalous increases in precipitation. The rebound is especially significant in East Antarctica, where four major glacier basins had previously shown signs of destabilization.

Satellite data shows ice sheet mass increase​

Big picture view:

Researchers from Tongji University and other institutions analyzed satellite gravimetry data from the GRACE and GRACE-FO missions, which measure variations in Earth’s gravity to detect changes in ice mass.

They found that between 2011 and 2020, the AIS was losing ice at a rate of 142 gigatons per year. But between 2021 and 2023, the trend reversed, with the ice sheet gaining approximately 108 gigatons per year — a historic turnaround.

That growth was enough to temporarily offset global sea level rise by about 0.3 millimeters per year during the same period.

Key glacier basins showed the most dramatic shift​

The most notable gains were in East Antarctica’s Wilkes Land and Queen Mary Land region, including the Totten, Denman, Moscow University, and Vincennes Bay glacier basins. These glaciers had been losing mass at an accelerating rate from 2011 to 2020 — driven by surface melting and faster ice discharge into the ocean — but now appear to have partially recovered.

Scientists warn, however, that this shift doesn’t mean the climate crisis is over. The gains were linked to unusual precipitation patterns, which may be temporary.

What's next:

The Antarctic Ice Sheet holds more than half of the world’s fresh water. For decades, it’s been one of the largest contributors to sea level rise, alongside Greenland’s melting ice and thermal expansion of warming oceans.

This new period of growth is both a surprise and a reminder of how dynamic and sensitive polar regions are to climate shifts. If similar conditions persist, they could reshape near-term sea level predictions. But most scientists stress the rebound is likely temporary unless supported by larger climatic trends.

The Source: This story is based on the peer-reviewed study "Spatiotemporal mass change rate analysis from 2002 to 2023 over the Antarctic Ice Sheet and four glacier basins in Wilkes-Queen Mary Land" published March 19, 2025, in Science China Earth Sciences. This story was reported from Los Angeles.

 

[BABANGUIDE64]

> You don't get it, Global Warming is not when climate gets hotter. It's when... it just isn't, okay?

 

[Rekieta’s Broken Penis]

these morons consider the completely fucking natural phenomenon of iceberg calving (ice falling off the edge of a glacier into the sea, because THERE'S SO MUCH SNOW/ICE PACK that it's eventually pushed into the sea because it's FLOWING and has to go SOMEWHERE) as "loss of ice".

Nigger the fact remains that the ice was lost

 

[BrunoMattei]

So, Global Warming was bullshit fear mongering all along? I want my time back from watching all of the endless after school specials, very special episodes and movies about global warming. That's easily thousands of hours in propaganda.

I played Awesome Possum on the Genesis, man. Where's my reparations?

 

[Megaton Punch]

So, Global Warming was bullshit fear mongering all along? I want my time back from watching all of the endless after school specials, very special episodes and movies about global warming. That's easily thousands of hours in propaganda.

I played Awesome Possum on the Genesis, man. Where's my reparations?

I unironically credit that shitty game (that sucks ass) for getting really into recycling as a kid. Something about collecting those cans was so satisfying, even if absolutely nothing else about that game was.

 

[Chicha Drinker]

An inconvenient truth has mind broken these people for almost 20 years now, ask a climate alarmist if Al Gore was wrong about the glaciers disappearing and they'll give you a snopes-tier pilpul answer, complete lunacy

 

[Troon Meet Noose]

I bet we could get a lot more ice if Pakistan and India nuked each other.

Plus it would halt their invasion of the western world.

 

[indigoisviolet]

See? Tariff those bastard penguins and they stop burning mattresses.

"It dey cultcha!" Fuck you, penguins.

 

[Daddy's Little Kitten]

Fuck you, penguins.

Hey, fuck you!

 

[Milkshake Sniffer]

An inconvenient truth has mind broken these people for almost 20 years now, ask a climate alarmist if Al Gore was wrong about the glaciers disappearing and they'll give you a snopes-tier pilpul answer, complete lunacy

This was a fraud from the start. The UK Government sent it to all schools but a school governor in Kent challenged it. (The relevant statutory powers to provide information don't permit propaganda or indoctrination.) The Court decided that it could not be shown without also highlighting what were termed the nine scientific errors. One of these was;

"Mr Gore's assertion that a sea-level rise of up to 20 feet would be caused by melting of ice in either West Antarctica or Greenland "in the near future". The judge said this was "distinctly alarmist" and it was common ground that if Greenland's ice melted it would release this amount of water - "but only after, and over, millennia"."

This was 2007; almost 20 years ago.

 

[Riot Guard]

I hate how "climate science" is so fake and gay that it's almost impossible to make any positive change. Why have we been letting these malicious fucks poison the topic for literally decades now?

 

[Incorrigible Bigotry]

SHADOW OF ANTARCTICA SPREADS
WITH IT'S MASSES
OF
PERMAAAAFROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOST

 

[Super-Chevy454]

So, Global Warming was bullshit fear mongering all along? I want my time back from watching all of the endless after school specials, very special episodes and movies about global warming. That's easily thousands of hours in propaganda.

I played Awesome Possum on the Genesis, man. Where's my reparations?

Watch them dusting off the old Global cooling mantra from the mothballs to keep fear mongering.

 

[The Punished Mitch]

Babe? It's time to switch up the fearmongering again

 

[deleuzeon]

I hate how "climate science" is so fake and gay that it's almost impossible to make any positive change. Why have we been letting these malicious fucks poison the topic for literally decades now?

Because it takes less effort for them to postulate a crisis in a complex system like the climate than it takes to debunk it, because the nature of complex systems is there are no neat causal explanations where changing one input produces a linear change in the output; it's very hard to falsify any grand narratives like "anthropomorphic climate change apocalypse" because it doesn't amount to a specific claim since none of the specific relationships within climate are understood.

 

[PS1gamenwatch]

Can't wait to hear how this is actually a bad thing!

Because it could be a sign of something ancient

 

[Loose Goose]

Can't wait to hear how this is actually a bad thing!

It is horrifying. We are seeing the clear signs of Global Freezing, an element of manmade climate change. We have to give up our freezers to stop this menace, import fifty million freezing people from the Global South, and stop bathing to preserve warmth. If you don't agree to all of this, you are a Climate Bigot who is killing the planet.

 

[EepEep]

Melting ice caps are bout to get dusty on the shelf, right next to the hole in the Ozone layer.

But bitching about the obscene amounts of pollution India and China create makes me an alt right racist or something.

 

[YOU'RE TAKING TOO LONG]

Nigger the fact remains that the ice was lost

I mean, not really? Earth is a relatively closed system and while there is entropic loss over time with phase shifts and such, ultimately what you end up with is water. The only time something is truly "lost" is when things are ejected outside of the stratosphere, usually via volcanic explosion, or meteor impact. Other than that, what's here is here, just locked up in different phases of transition and change. Water especially. Ice becomes water, water becomes vapor, vapor becomes water. There's a sort of "life cycle of water" and nothing is truly lost or gained, outside of extremely rare moments that are kind of out of our control.

 

[whatever I feel like]

Yes, I heard they needed the ice and spurted many cummies that way.

You need not thank me, I consider cummying to be my service to the world.

 

[TowinKarz]

See? Tariff those bastard penguins and they stop burning mattresses.

"It dey cultcha!" Fuck you, penguins.

Now if only we could get them to stop throwing old car batteries into the sea.

Melting ice caps are bout to get dusty on the shelf, right next to the hole in the Ozone layer.

But bitching about the obscene amounts of pollution India and China create makes me an alt right racist or something.

Air so bad it's chewable? I sleep

Put a candy wrapper in the wrong recycling bin? REAL SHIT.

This was 2007; almost 20 years ago.

To just put a cap on it, I can remember when 2000 was the year we'd lose all the glaciers... as foretold by "the science: in 1994.