GoKawiilStudy finds Laurentide ice remnant began regrowing 2,000 years ago, then reversed after 1960
A Science study led by Columbia geologist Nicolás Young examined the Barnes Ice Cap, the last surviving fragment of the Laurentide Ice Sheet in the Canadian Arctic, and found it shrank to its smallest size about 3,600 years ago before starting to expand again around 2,000 years ago. The researchers say that regrowth, which they interpret as the beginning of a new glaciation, halted and reversed around 1960 due to human-caused warming.
GoKawiil's interpretation of the reporting above, not reported fact.
The findings suggest Earth may have been edging toward a new ice age before industrial-era warming intervened, which could reshape scientific understanding of natural climate cycles versus human influence. Because Barnes Ice Cap is cold-based and frozen to bedrock, it preserved a rare, undisturbed physical record that researchers say offers unusually direct evidence for past ice-sheet behavior, though this interpretation rests on a single ice-cap record.
- Barnes Ice Cap, the last Laurentide Ice Sheet remnant, shrank to its minimum size 3,600 years ago.
- It appears to have begun regrowing around 2,000 years ago, suggesting a new glaciation was underway.
- Researchers say human-caused warming halted and reversed this natural ice growth trend around 1960.
Source: arstechnica.com, 2026-10-24
Published there as: “Ice sheet expansion may have started 2,000 years ago, but we canceled that”
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