Glaciers around the world are losing mass due to climate change, and Antarctica is also affected. The process at the Hektor Glacier was tracked via satellite for the first time. This was reported by US scientists led by Naomi Ochwat from the University of Colorado Boulder. Their findings are of great value to research, but raise a question: how are other, much larger glaciers in Antarctica behaving?
The Hector Glacier on the Antarctic Peninsula has surprised scientists with its dramatic ice loss: between January 2022 and March 2023, the glacier lost around 25 km in length. At times, 800 metres of ice broke off every day. As the team now reports in the journal “Nature Geoscience”, this is about ten times the highest glacier retreat rate observed to date.
Naomi Ochwat commented: ‘When we flew over the Hektoria Glacier in early 2024, I could hardly believe the extent of the collapsed area. I had already seen the fjord and the striking mountain formations on satellite images, but the sight on the ground deeply shook me.’
The findings, published on 3 November 2025, shed new light on the risks facing Antarctica. What happened on a small scale at the Hektoria Glacier could threaten much larger glaciers. Under similar conditions, an identical process could be repeated at Antarctic giants such as the Thwaites or Pine Island Glaciers. The ice flows caused by this breaking or ‘calving’ are considered particularly critical for global sea level rise.
Martin Truffer, a researcher at the University of Alaska who was not involved in the study, told the Science Media Centre that such an extreme case had never been documented since the beginning of the satellite era. ‘However, there are indications that similar processes have also occurred in the past. It is almost certain that it will happen again in the future.’
Heiner Kubny, PolarJournal