Violent 'storms' under Antarctica's ice could be speeding its decline

The West Antarctic Ice Sheet covers some 760,000 square miles and is up to 1.2 miles thick. If it were to ever melt away entirely, it would add 10 feet to global sea levels. Even considering how quickly humans are heating the planet, such a change would likely unfold over centuries — that’s how much ice we’re talking about here. But scientists are finding more and more evidence that Antarctica’s ice is in far more peril than previously believed , with many abrupt changes, like the loss of sea ice , reinforcing one another.

We can now add underwater “storms” to the troubles unfolding around the frozen continent. A new paper suggests that vortices are drawing relatively warm waters across the underside of the extension of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet, known as the ice shelf, floating