‘Explosion of melt rates’: 20% of Swiss glaciers lost in five years

The Guardian World Thursday 01 October 2026, 04:00 UTC By Ajit Niranjan 1 min read

Key Points

Alpine regions in Europe experiencing extreme glacier collapse due to heat-trapping effects of fossil fuel pollutionSwitzerland has lost almost one-fifth of its ice in just five years, research has found, in a dramatic reshaping of the Alpine country whose big white glaciers have been reduced to moonlike rock deserts, scientists say. Swiss glaciers shrank by 5.5% in the first eight months of 2026, according to an annual monitoring report, after a summer of scorching heatwaves that followed a...

Alpine regions in Europe experiencing extreme glacier collapse due to heat-trapping effects of fossil fuel pollution

Switzerland has lost almost one-fifth of its ice in just five years, research has found, in a dramatic reshaping of the Alpine country whose big white glaciers have been reduced to moonlike rock deserts, scientists say.

Swiss glaciers shrank by 5.5% in the first eight months of 2026, according to an annual monitoring report, after a summer of scorching heatwaves that followed a winter with little snow. The reduction in ice volume falls just shy of the record set in 2022 and brings the total loss of glacier ice since 2021 to 19.4%.

Swiss (ORG) Europe (LOCATION) Alpine (ORG)

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‘Explosion of melt rates’: 20% of Swiss glaciers lost in five years

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