Catastrophe In The Making
As humans, we always feel the need to investigate things to find out their origins. Sometimes, we make a groundbreaking discovery and end up helping the entire world. However, sometimes it is an entirely different story. Our curiosity to find out more about the planet we live in can lead to some very dangerous aftereffects.
Jenny Uhling/Pexels
We all know that everywhere we go, bacteria thrives. But can you imagine what other kinds of living organisms existed way before we did? In places where there is ice, like in Alaska where permafrost is thick, we get to see just how dangerous they can get. It’s the perfect environment for dormant catastrophes.
Origins
Alaska is greatly known for ice – glaciers, ice caps and permafrost. It’s a wild and beautiful place that many seek to visit. I mean, who can blame them? It’s one of the very few places you can visit and enjoy the sceneries. But aside from the treasures this place holds, there is something very sinister underneath.
Aaron Houston/Pexels
Because scientists always have a thirst for knowledge, they decided that they wanted to further their knowledge on what the permafrost is, how it was made, what it does, and what’s in it because after all, it covers 85% of the entire state. So, with the help of the military, they bore a tunnel beneath the tundra.
Permafrost
Many people ask, “What’s a permafrost?” It’s a term that refers to the type of frozen soil that covers most of the entire state. But why is this considered important? Why do scientists feel the need to learn more about this phenomena? What’s the difference between regular snow and iced grounds?
Charles Tarnocai/Agriculture And Agri-Food Canadaa
Scientists have said that this phenomena impacts 25% of the Northern Hemisphere. But permafrost doesn’t just consist of gravel, sand and soil, it usually happens when the ground remains at freezing temperatures for so long even throughout weather changes. It can also happen beneath the depths of our oceans, which can make for negative repercussions.
What’s Next
As amazing as this might sound though, permafrost doesn’t just exist anywhere with snow or cold temperatures. The ideal temperature should be higher than 32° F – which is anywhere in Eastern Europe, Russia, China, Greenland and in Alaska. While some may be shallow in depth, but it does make up for length which can stretch for more than 3,000 ft.
Dj Tyson/
But not all permafrost is the same. There are two types that people are not aware about. The first is called continuous permafrost which is a single sheet of frozen ground and the other is called discontinuous permofrost which is ice that’s broken up into several different pieces. But the real problem lies inside of it.
Global Warming
Over the years, the Earth has gathered enough greenhouse gases that cause the planet’s ultimate demise. Too much of these gases cause the atmosphere to heat up and therefore affecting the every day weather we experience. What used to be a bearable hot day, is now looking more like something out of a horror movie.
Thomas Nash/High Country News
This in turn affects the permafrost – the ice melts due to the temperature rising by more than 40° F. And there is no way that we can get it back down even if we do make some changes to our gas outputs. It’s too late and with the way we are producing so much more carbon dioxide, it’s bound to get out of hand.
A Sneak Peek Into The Past
The tunnel that was created by the scientists is part of the Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory where they conduct studies of the unique behavior of the permafrost and how it reacts to the current climate changes. This also helps researchers like U.S. Army Corps of Engineers geochemist Dr. Thomas Douglas get an idea of what it was like in the past.
Lyndon Atmospheric Sciences
Contrary to what most believe that the tundra is a wasteland of ice and nothingness, it is far from that. Beneath the frozen ground, it is actually full of prehistoric remains that have been preserved for thousands of years because of the icy temperatures. And this much is true especially for the Fairbanks tunnel. People who have visited the inside of the tunnel claim that there are bones and tusks of mammoths sticking out from the walls.
Prehistoric
Unbeknownst to many, the permafrost is an ecosystem of its own but only frozen in time. It is filled with the remains of creatures that used to roam the earth way before humans existed. From extinct woolly rhinoceroses to ancient plants, everything that had life had been preserved due to the ice.
Oregon Museum of Science and Industry
But no matter how fascinating this is to all of us, this presents a real problem for the whole planet. Like all the other lifeforms present today, these ancient flora and fauna carry twice as much carbon with them. According to one scientist, “The permafrost contains twice as much carbon as is currently in Earth’s atmosphere. That’s 1,600 billion metric tons.”
Launching An Investigation
The amount of carbon contained inside the permafrost is the thing that most worries Douglas and all the other scientists dedicated to finding out the after effects of this biohazard. This now raises the question of what will happen when it finally begins to melt. And with this, they launched an experiment to find out.
Julie Parno/U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center
During the investigation, scientists at CRREL chose areas to drill. They decided that each one should be drilled at about 5 inches long and 2.4 inches across and remove those sections to take into the laboratory. When they got to the laboratory, they slowly warmed the ice sections and it wasn’t long until they saw what they had expected to happen.
Ancient Bacteria
The scientists involved in the project were excited to make groundbreaking discoveries. They now had frozen samples of the permafrost that they can perform experiments on. So when they started thawing the ice, they had already expected the results and were just waiting on the actual confirmation of their hypothesis.
Julia Bartoli and Chantal Abergel, IGS and CNRS-AMU
“This is material that stayed frozen for 25,000 years,” said Douglas. “And given the right environmental conditions, it came back [to life] again vigorously.” Much to the surprise of many, bacteria don’t actually die in freezing temperatures, instead, they are suspended and as temperatures rise and the ice starts to defrost, it wakes up again.
Effects of Global Warming
The world is not what it once was and with every day that passes and the environment goes through silent drastic changes, we face the consequences. Because of so much greenhouse gases being accumulated in the ozone layer, it causes the whole planet to warm up and these icy terrains are no exception.
Kevin Schaefer/NSIDC
Though we can account for all-year winter, but it does not mean that the place is not susceptible to temperature changes. And in the midst of all this chaos, the bacterium Bacillus anthracis may make an appearance once again. It is typically associated with biological warfare, this substance leads to anthrax – a potentially lethal infection that once terrorized the frozen landscape of Siberia.
History Will Repeat Itself
Back in Alaska, researchers took special notice that the resurrected bacteria from the permafrost sample they brought in, reacted with dead animals and plant matter stored within the same layer of permafrost they were found in. This did not bode well for them as they knew what was going to happen next.
Travis S./Flickr
With this reaction observed, the output for these reactions were going to affect the planet greatly – transforming carbon into methane and carbon dioxide in the process. And this is a cause and effect that is all too familiar. Both of these gases are responsible for climate change.
Reverse Effect
To this day, Alaska has been known by many environmental scientists as a place where carbon dioxide is more likely to be absorbed from the atmosphere than being a place where it emits. However, as the permafrost slowly starts to thaw, we may see a reversal.
Steve Ringman/The Seattle Times
This is no longer a guess as in 2017, scientists have observed that the north of the region has shown significant emissions of this gas. Scientists have also estimated that there are 1,400 gigatons of this element frozen in the permafrost all around the planet. This is four times the level of carbon humans and all other living species have emitted into the atmosphere in the last 260 years.
Not The Only One
Ancient bacteria won’t be the only problem, though. It is true that although they contribute to the majority of the emissions on carbon dioxide and methane, they are not entirely responsible for this build-up. Because of the thickness of permafrost, underground reservoirs may be kept hidden.
Steve Ringman/The Seattle Times
But now that it’s slowly melting, these reservoirs will then be exposed to open air and methane from inside can be released to the atmosphere through these holes. And this will be catastrophic because reservoirs are continuously expelling these gases.
What Happens Next?
This then begs the question, “What happens when large amounts of these gases make their way into the atmosphere?” Most people are not aware but the reason why an abundance of carbon dioxide is bad for the environment is because this gas radiates energy downwards which in turn warms the planet.
The Arctic Institute
While this process may be natural and necessary, it is an entirely different story if more carbon dioxide is released from the melting permafrost because the global warming we know today will spiral out of control. In fact, at this rate, scientists believe that the temperature will rise to as much as 10° F over the next 100 years.
Worried Yet?
In 2018 NASA chemist Charles Miller told NPR, “We have evidence that Alaska has changed from being a net absorber of carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere to a net exporter of the gas back to the atmosphere.” It also doesn’t help that the ancient bacteria are coming to life with a vengeance.
USGS
“The analogy is that it’s a big train about to derail,” ecologist Dr. Merritt Turetsky, from the University of Guelph in Ontario, told the Toronto Star in 2011. “Once it begins, permafrost thaw occurs slowly, but you can’t stop it. [And] that lack of control makes anybody feel nervous.”
Cause And Effect
No matter how much scientists are able to study data and draw up a prediction, deep down they are unsure as to how much of an impact it will cause to the whole world. For instance, if thawing occurs, erosion will cause much of the remaining carbon in the ice melt to wash away into the Arctic’s waters.
Flickr
Not only that, but a warmer environment will also eventually lead to new vegetation to spring up across the tundra. And this in turn will cause the flora to reabsorb some of the harmful gases being produced by the melting permafrost. It’s a complicated cycle that is unfortunately inevitable today.
Piece Of The Puzzle
Permafrost functions more than just hardened prehistoric ice on the ground. Essentially, from up above, you will see that it acts like a bonding agent that sticks together the layers of rocks and other materials that make up the surface of our planet. It’s almost like it’s the missing piece of puzzle that is Earth.
CRREL
When the permafrost melts, it may affect terrain. Overnight, drastic changes can occur, such as empty lakes, redirection of river flow and disintegration of shorelines. It is the worst for places where frozen water makes up more than ¾ of the ground. And it’s slowly happening today.
Wake-Up Call
In 2019 Turetsky told Anchorage Daily News, “It can happen super quickly, even in a matter of months. This has been a wake-up call to the climate science community. What has been happening at some of our field sites is a whole different ball game.”
Mikhail Kanevskiy / University of Alaska Fairbanks, Institute of Northern Engineering
At the end of the day, no matter how many researchers conduct studies and try their best to put out predictions, nobody can be sure as to what the full effects of the thawing permafrost would be. Researchers like Turetsky believe that although there are measures to help curb the emissions, she worries that it might be a little too late.
Making A Change
People worry about how the changes in climate might affect the overall environment we live in. Although different scientists have different opinions on the matter, we should still strive to make a change. It may not be easy, but one small deed can go a long way.
David Olefelot
We don’t need to be famous or need to be some type of social influencer, all we need to do is to create an awareness in ourself that whatever small changes we make can radiate on to others and will eventually lead to others following in your footsteps.
Save Mother Earth
It might be a scary thing to be learning this now, but this is unfortunately the inevitable. As more and more cities are improving and technology and machines are ever evolving, we are predicted to emit more and more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. People want change and the Earth pays for it.
Carolyn Gibson
According to Yogi Berra’s iconic catch phrase, “It ain’t over till it’s over.” So while we still have a chance to make a difference, we should make it a priority to be vigilant and proactive. After all, we want a better world for our children and our children’s children. We should not give up on Mother Earth, not yet. Not ever.