Reporting from Lijiang, China - If you want to see a glacier melt with your bare eyes, try Yulong Snow Mountain, an 18,000-foot peak in southern China's Yunnan province. On this early December morning, the mountain is etched against the technicolor sky in shades of gray -- definitely more gray than white. Naked boulders of limestone and daubs of shrubbery protrude from the shallow snow cover. In the study of climate change, glaciers are sometimes likened to the canaries in the coal mine, and to many observers the condition of Yulong ("Jade Dragon") mountain is troubling. He Yuanqing, one of China's leading glacier experts, found that the mountain's largest glacier, known as Baishui No. 1, has retreated about 275 yards since 1982. .... Anywhere from five to 20 scientists work here at any given time -- planting sticks in the drifts to measure snow accumulation and taking time-lapse photographs of the retreating snows and the advancing tree line up the mountain. Yulong Snow Mountain is a fitting object for their obsession: It has the southernmost glaciers on the Eurasian continent. Its location at the edge of the Tibetan plateau is also critical. .... The Tibetan plateau is also extremely vulnerable to global warming. The China Meteorological Administration calculates that temperatures on the plateau have risen an average of 0.58 degrees Fahrenheit per decade, more than four times the average warming rate in China as a whole. .... When glaciers disappear, they don't necessarily go quietly. The ice becomes unstable; gentle slopes of snow erode into steep ridges that can collapse at unpredictable times. Yulong has had two such avalanches recently -- one in 2004 and another over the summer.
In the study of climate change, glaciers are sometimes likened to the canaries in the coal mine, and to many observers the condition of Yulong ("Jade Dragon") mountain is troubling. He Yuanqing, one of China's leading glacier experts, found that the mountain's largest glacier, known as Baishui No. 1, has retreated about 275 yards since 1982.
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Anywhere from five to 20 scientists work here at any given time -- planting sticks in the drifts to measure snow accumulation and taking time-lapse photographs of the retreating snows and the advancing tree line up the mountain. Yulong Snow Mountain is a fitting object for their obsession: It has the southernmost glaciers on the Eurasian continent. Its location at the edge of the Tibetan plateau is also critical.
The Tibetan plateau is also extremely vulnerable to global warming. The China Meteorological Administration calculates that temperatures on the plateau have risen an average of 0.58 degrees Fahrenheit per decade, more than four times the average warming rate in China as a whole.
When glaciers disappear, they don't necessarily go quietly. The ice becomes unstable; gentle slopes of snow erode into steep ridges that can collapse at unpredictable times. Yulong has had two such avalanches recently -- one in 2004 and another over the summer.
