Earth’s Melting Ice is Tracked by Lasers used by the New Satellite from NASA
The humanity will finally have a stronger data-backed vision of exactly what happens to the ice on Earth and how fast it is melting, according to NASA which will use a $1 billion satellite to analyze it.
ICESat-2 the satellite is traveling every 91 days, and its measurement is similar to the ones a Smart car has. The satellite will send lasers back down to Earth an infinite amount of times so the scientists will get precise measurements from those—down to within a centimeter—of the polar ice sheets of the planet and according to the agency how they are changing.
Scientist have now the possibility to examine the way in which ice responds to changes in the ocean and the atmosphere offering them a picture over time of what makes the ice melt or not.
Once they have enough data about the thickness of the sea ice and also how high the ice sheets are, they will manufacture their future models in such a way that they will better predict potential sea level rise scenarios, based on information provided by NASA.
The company says that the melting ice in Antarctica and Greenland has gotten the global sea level increased by more than a millimeter per year, which translates into a third of the overall increase which is shocking.
The satellite, ICESat-2, launched on 15 of September and can provide even in a better way much more comprehensive coverage of ice loss across the world.
ICESat-2′ first data will start coming back by the middle of October. The scientists are extremely excited to see what data the satellite brings them back and how it can make us change the world in order to avoid massive ice melts.
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