Melting Antarctic ice sheets may be causing larger volcanic eruptions
Melting ice sheets are often considered synonymous with climate change in the media, with evocative images of lone polar bears floating on ever-shrinking rafts of ice. While impacts such as sea level rise and salinity changes are commonly reported, one lesser-known consequence is the effect on volcanoes.
During deglaciation, melting of kilometers-thick ice sheets reduces the mass weighing down the land, which leads to uplift. This alters the pressure inside magma chambers lying below the Earth's surface, causing volcanic eruptions.
Research, published in Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems, suggests that mass unloading due to melting of Antarctic ice sheets (isostatic rebound) is triggering eruptions of greater frequency and magnitude in the West Antarctic Rift System, one of Earth's largest volcanic provinces with over 100 eruptive centers.
[...]
Therefore, understanding the sensitivity of this ice mass unloading of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet on magma chambers has important implications for being able to accurately predict future consequences on Earth's interconnected geological systems.