What if Antarctica MELTED?

This is Antarctica. Today, it is mainly known for ice, penguins and not much else. Or, another way, Antarctica is easily forgotten and some people don't even bother to include it on their world maps. But in modern times, we're starting to hear more and more about Earth's southernmost continent. Mainly through news about melting ice, rising sea levels, and maybe some popular documentaries. What I'm saying: ice and penguins. However, in general the debate about Antarctica focuses on climate change. And the reason for this is obvious: of course, climate change is a tremendous issue. And one, which I myself have spent a lot of time arguing about.

But let's take a step back from the question of climate change, for just a minute, to ask ourselves: if all the ice

melted

,

what

would happen and

what

would we find underneath? Let's start first with what would happen to the rest of the world. Thus, 98% of the surface of Antarctica is covered by a huge ice sheet, with an average depth of 1.6 kilometers. And, despite how big or small Antarctica looks on maps, it is actually the fifth largest continent on Earth, with an area of ​​14 million square kilometers. That makes it 1.4 times the size of Europe and almost twice the size of Australia.

So, some quick calculations: 14 million square kilometers of ice, 1.6 kilometers deep, gives about 26.5 million cubic kilometers of ice. For comparison, that's almost 11 times the volume of the Gulf of Mexico. And, in total, Antarctica contains 70% of the Earth's fresh water. So if everything were to melt, the entire world would feel the impacts. First, and perhaps most obvious, sea level would rise by about 60 meters. This would cause widespread flooding around the world and nowhere near the coast would be safe. Places like the US state of Florida, the Amazon River basin and central China would disappear completely under the ocean.

In total, this event could displace between 1,000 and 2,000 million people. Then all this fresh water would alter the salinity aka. the salinity of the ocean. This in itself would harm many marine populations and could even force the extinction of sensitive species, such as corals. But more importantly, decreasing salinity would alter the density of ocean water, which in turn could alter ocean currents. This would alter the entire circulation of water, in the oceans and in the atmosphere. In short, the Earth's climate could be drastically altered. Potentially turning traditionally human agricultural lands into deserts, while places that might be deserts today could become flood-prone areas, unequipped for large-scale agriculture.

And, because Earth's climate system is so complex, we would really have no way of knowing where changes like this would occur. Basically, we would be easy targets in the face of drastic global change. But what about the land of Antarctica? What would we find there? Well, today Antarctica looks like this. Pretty boring. These parts are not technically part of the continent, but are simply ice shelves hanging over the ocean. Removing them, it still looks pretty unspectacular. But removing ALL the ice reveals something unexpected. What appeared to be a single land mass is actually a collection of mountainous islands, with 5 main bodies and a group of smaller islands near a large flat region, making up most of the Earth's surface.

So what now looks like a contiguous continent, in many ways looks a lot like Australia and its accompanying Malay Archipelago. A large plain, surrounded by more mountainous islands. The notable features of the current continent would be isolated on their own islands. The Antarctic Peninsula would become the largest of these islands, while the Vinson Massif, the highest mountain on the continent, would become the island with the highest elevation. The Transantarctic Mountain Range, now the fourth longest mountain range on Earth, would barely remain connected to the main landmass. In comparison, the Antarctic Peninsula would measure approximately 250,000 square kilometers.

Which is almost 50,000 square kilometers larger than Great Britain and barely smaller than California. Continental Antarctica would be half its previous size, reaching 7 million square kilometers. Or about the same size as Australia. One last thing before continuing is what the continent would look like today, once the ice was removed. But over time this would change. You see, because the Earth was under such heavy ice for so long, the crust actually sank into the mantle here. Once all that heavy ice was removed, it would slowly rise again, over many thousands of years. This is called "isostatic rebound" and is currently happening in places like Canada and Norway, as a result of the glaciers of the last Ice Age.

So when all is said and done, and the crust is back in place, Antarctica would look more like this. Now, that would be 3 large land masses. The largest is around 9 million square kilometers, slightly smaller than Europe. Then the aforementioned Peninsula Island, and this large mountainous region (which would probably become known as Marie Byrd Island; see "a map of modern Antarctica," for why); both would be approximately 650,000 square kilometers in size. This would put them both ahead of Madagascar, but behind Borneo in size, making them the fourth and fifth largest islands on the planet. Well, now that we know what the earth would be like, the next thing we need to know is what we would actually find there.

Despite what many people might expect, even without ice, Antarctica today would still be an arid and inhospitable country. First of all, it would still be located right at the South Pole, meaning temperatures would be frigid year-round. And for half the year, the Sun would never rise above the horizon. And like other places on Earth that have experienced recent ice ages, such as Canada, Scandinavia and northern Russia, Antarctica would be devoid of most soil and arable land. After millions of years under those huge ice sheets, all the sand, silt and clay would have dispersed. And what's still left underneath is probably just bedrock and gravel.

They are not the best conditions for agriculture. The best we can hope for is that a tundra ecosystem will slowly develop, with wide expanses of moss and lichen. Maybe still with millions of penguins. Here is the hope. If we wanted, the land could be used as pasture for musk oxen, which are capable of living in such conditions. And perhaps species like arctic hares and arctic foxes could be captured by boat to create a true ecosystem. In addition, the landscape would be riddled with small lakes and ponds, similar to northern Canada, also due to glaciation. And most low elevation regions would end up looking like this.

And while large-scale agriculture would be impossible here, Antarctica could become a center for another important economic activity: mining. You see, Antarctica was once part of the supercontinent called Gondwana, 600 million years ago. In addition to Antarctica, Gondwana included the landmasses of South America, Africa, Arabia, India, and Australia. And although each of these places has moved away from each other, they still share a common wealth of natural resources. And Antarctica is expected to share a similar abundance of wealth. Perhaps most importantly, huge coal and oil resources are predicted to lie beneath Antarctica, which until now have remained completely untapped.

Deposits of iron, copper, platinum, gold, silver and uranium are also expected to be found here. However, who exactly will be able to take advantage of these resources is still up in the air. Currently, seven countries claim Antarctica, but these claims are tenuous and will most likely be ignored, if real land emerges. So no one knows what the fight for Antarctica would be like. Hopefully the UN could mitigate the land distribution to prevent things from turning violent. Perhaps land could even be allocated, based on how much land a country lost due to sea level rise. In a way, then, Antarctica could become a land of refuge, and even a country of its own.

United by climate change, populated by refugees, rich for their abundant resources and, perhaps, with a very unique gastronomy. I hope you enjoyed this video. If you want to see more, consider hitting the like button and subscribing to see more videos like this in the future. I'm getting ready to start another small series, which I hope to start next week. And you don't want to miss that. But for now, thanks for watching.