Switzerland holds ‘funeral’ for glacier lost to climate change
IN MEMORIAM
Around 250 people on Sunday joined the solemn two-hour climb up to the foot of a rapidly melting glacier in Switzerland.
OUT OF TIME
Located about 2,600 metres above sea level, the Pizol glacier in the Glarus Alps is set to vanish completely by 2030, scientists have said.
BLEAK FUTURE
Scientists have warned 90% of Alpine glaciers could disappear by the end of this century if greenhouse gases are not reined in.
MELS,SWITZERLAND: Dozens of people will undertake a “funeral march” up a steep Swiss mountainside on Sunday to mark the disappearance of an Alpine glacier amid growing global alarm over climate change.
The Pizol “has lost so much substance that from a scientific perspective it is no longer a glacier”, Alessandra Degiacomi, of the Swiss Association for Climate Protection, said.
Dressed in black, they will make the solemn two-hour “funeral march” up the side of Pizol mountain in northeastern Switzerland to the foot of the steep and rapidly melting ice formation, situated at an altitude of around 2,700 metres near the Liechtenstein and Austrian borders.
Once they arrive, a chaplain and several scientists will give sombre speeches in remembrance of the glacier, accompanied by the mournful tones of alphorns - a 3.6-metre, pipeshaped wooden instrument.
A wreath will be laid for the Pizol glacier, which has been one of the most studied glaciers in the Alps.
“Since 1850, we estimate that more than 500 Swiss glaciers have completely disappeared, including 50 that were named,” Matthias Huss, a glaciologist at the ETH technical university in Zurich, said. Pizol may not be the first glacier to vanish in Switzerland, but “you could say it is the first to disappear that has been very thoroughly studied”, said Huss, who will participate in Sunday’s ceremony. Pizol has lost 80-90% of its volume just since 2006, leaving behind a mere 26,000 square metres of ice, or “less than four football fields”, Huss said.