Glacier Grows Despite Global Warming

A 3-mile-wide glacier located in Argentina's Patagonia region is defying global warming. The Perito Moreno ice field, seen here May 18, 2009, is one of the few glaciers in the world that's actually growing.

AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko, File

In this May 18, 2009 file photo, a tourist looks back through a cave on Perito Moreno Glacier in Los Glaciares National Park in Argentina's Patagonia region.

AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko, File

In this May 18, 2009 file photo, tourists stand on Perito Moreno Glacier in Los Glaciares National Park in Argentina's Patagonia region.

AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko, File

If the West Antarctic ice sheet collapses, the global sea level will rise about 10 feet, researchers said in the May 15 edition of the journal Science. That's about half the rise that was previously predicted. Scientists say most of the increase would occur along the East and West Coasts of the U.S. Here, ice melts near Biscoe Island in Antarctica.

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Since 2003, Greenland, Alaska and Antarctica have lost 2 trillion tons of land ice, according to satellite data that NASA released in 2008. Greenland took the heaviest hit from climate change, losing enough ice to fill the Chesapeake Bay 11 times, a NASA geophysicist said. Here, tourists explore Greenland's ice cap in 2003.

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Melting land ice translates into higher sea levels. Ice lost from the Greenland, Alaska and Antarctica has raised oceans one-fifth of an inch since 2003, said the geophysicist, Scott Luthcke. Here, birds fly over a glacier in Antarctica in 2007.

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Scientists say a tsunami hit the New York City region about 2,3000 years ago, a conclusion they reached after a preliminary study of dirt deposits in the area. They're conducting more tests to confirm their theory.

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The scientists said the tsunami was not as big or powerful as the Asian Tsunami of 2004, which killed more than 225,000 people in 11 countries. Here, tourists react as the tsunami moves in near Krabi, Thailand on Dec. 26, 2004. (Sources: BBC News, AP)

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This satellite photo released by the National Snow and Ice Data Center at the University of Colorado at Boulder shows the Wilkins Ice Shelf on March 6, 2008 on the Southwest Antarctic Peninsula as it began to break apart. An area of an Antarctic ice shelf nearly the size of New York City has broken into icebergs in the month of April after the collapse of an ice bridge widely blamed on global warming, a scientist said Tuesday, April 28.

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An Envisat Advanced Synthetic Aperture Radar (ASAR) image dated April 28, 2009 and made available on Wednesday, April 29, 2009 shows the breaking away of the ice bridge of the Wilkins Ice Shelf in Antarctica - The Charcot Island, visible in the upper left corner of the image, and the Wilkins Ice Shelf in the lower right corner, are connected by an ice bridge which is approximately 100 kilometers long and only a few kilometers wide. Should the ice bridge break up due to increasing temperatures in the Antarctic spring, this would remove the stabilizing factor that has been keeping the ice sheet grounded to the peninsula.

AP Photo/European Space Agency ESA

A new report examines the human cost of climate change, which it said causes more than 300,000 deaths per year. The report, released Friday, shows the impact of climate change on population displacement, malnutrition and diseases, such as malaria. "Climate change is not something waiting to happen," said former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan.

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These images from NASA show Arctic sea ice thickness in 2008 and 2003. The data iondicates dramatic thinning, especially near the North Pole, seen in dark blue. Darker blue depicts thinner ice, while white shows the thickest areas. The Arctic's reserve of thick ice that's more than 2 years old makes up 10 percent of its winter ice cover, down from 40 percent in the past.

NASA Goddard's Scientific Visualization Studio

A prominent British economist and author of a major report on the cost global warming said in February that if climate change isn't dealt with decisively, it could cause "extended world war." Lord Nicholas Stern said that as weather patterns change, it could create mass migrations which would, in turn, set off mass conflict.

Charles J. Hanley, AP

Stern spoke at a meeting of prominent environment ministers in South Africa. Citing an example of climate change, the environment minister of Congo said water levels in Uganda's Lake Victoria, seen above in 2006, had dropped 10 feet in the past six years.

Kirsty Wigglesworth, AP

A rise in methane has scientists worried that melting Arctic ice could be releasing ancient stores of the gas. Here, a glacier makes its way to Croaker Bay in Canada last summer.

Jonathan Hayward, CP / AP

A massive crack in Petermann Glacier in northern Greenland has at least one scientist predicting that a big part of the Northern Hemisphere's largest floating glacier will be gone within a year. Some experts said it's too soon to pin the blame on global warming.

Byrd Polar Research Center / AP

The sun beats down on dairy cattle in Bakersfield, Calif. Rising global temperatures are causing problems around the world. Last year marked the warmest year ever recorded for Earth's land areas.

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A record amount of Greenland's ice sheet melted last summer -- 19 billion tons more than the previous high mark. And for the first time on record, the Northwest Passage was open to navigation.

John McConnico, AP

Some 4 million acres of mature trees in Alaska have been killed by spruce bark beetles. Scientists believe that warmer temperatures have allowed the beetles to breed and mature twice as fast as normal.

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Rising seas threaten areas like Grand-Lahou in the Ivory Coast. A 2007 climate change report predicts that sea levels will increase seven to 23 inches by 2100, speeding erosion and threatening coastal land.

Issouf Sanogo, AFP / Getty Images