It's not uncommon for scientists at Earth's North and South Poles to make new discoveries, such as that of a worrying natural gas trapped under the ice in the Arctic. Recently, thanks to satellite images, researchers have discovered the presence of a landscape dating back more than 34 million years hidden beneath the surface. A major geological revelation, which we explain in detail below.
A 34-million-year-old landscape discovered
After discovering a fossil forest dating back to the Upper Cretaceous in Antarctica a few years ago, scientists have made another important discovery. Well hidden under a thick layer of ice more than a kilometer thick, hides at the South Pole a river landscape dating back 34 million years! This period in the history of our planet is called the Eocene. According to the website of the National Museum of Natural History, this period is between -56 and -34 million years before our era. It is marked by a generally warm climate, and by a significant diversification of terrestrial vertebrates, notably birds and mammals. During the Eocene, there was no ice at the poles, which explains the presence of a river on the former White Continent. According to The Brighter Side of News, which reported the story, this lost world, similar to Jurassic Park, not only allows us to learn more about Earth's past, but also its future.
A discovery beneficial to understanding ice melt
This "small" discovery, which covers some 10 million square kilometers, is not the result of drilling but of images captured by RADARSAT, a Canadian satellite system. However, in the future, there is nothing to say that scientists will not conduct drilling. Currently, the international consortium of scientists united within the European project Beyond EPICA – Oldest Ice has managed to reach ice dating back more than 1.2 million years. To achieve this, they drilled a 2,800-meter-long core into the Antarctic ice sheet.
Lead author of the study, Stewart Jamieson, a glaciologist at Durham University in the United Kingdom, says it's "like discovering a time capsule." By studying this cold-preserved landscape, the researchers hope to better understand past freeze-thaw cycles and predict ice melt. Due to global warming, sea levels are expected to rise worldwide, potentially disrupting our perception of time. For example, where the "fossil river" was discovered, the University of Texas Geophysical Institute says the amount of ice present, if it were to melt, would raise sea levels by 7.6 meters or more. And as Stewart Jamieson explains, it's the landscape underneath that influences how the water will be distributed if it melts: And that's a problem because relief controls how ice in Antarctica flows, and it controls how it might respond to past, present, and future climate changes. The poles, mysterious places in danger kilometers below the Earth's surface, beneath the polar ice, many secrets still lie hidden. These futuristic photos of Antarctica imagined in 2035 are proof that these white expanses where it gets as cold as -90 degrees in winter are a source of fantasies. Unfortunately, we may soon discover what mysteries they hold: according to experts, the Antarctic ice cap loses around 150 billion tons of ice every year...
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