“Thwaites glacier is huge and contains vast amounts of ice above sea level that, if transported into the ocean, would affect global sea level significantly” researcher Dorotea Iovino on retreat and ice melt in West Antarctica. A NASA-led study has found that a giant, growing cavern two-thirds the area of Manhattan is contributing to the rapid melting of Antarctica’s Thwaites Glacier. Comment by Dorotea Iovino, CMCC scientist at the ODA – Ocean modeling and Data Assimilation Division

Continued warming of the Arctic atmosphere and ocean are driving broad change in the environmental system in predicted and, also, unexpected ways. New emerging threats are taking form and highlighting the level of uncertainty in the breadth of environmental change that is to come. A report tracking sea ice, snow cover, air temperature, ocean temperature, the Greenland ice sheet, vegetation and ecosystem changes during the 2018 calendar year.