The Swiss weather service said Monday a heat wave has driven the zero-degree Celsius level to its highest altitude since recordings on it in Switzerland began nearly 70 years ago, an ominous new sign for the country's vaunted glaciers.
MeteoSwiss says the zero-degree isotherm level reached 5,298 metres above sea level over Switzerland overnight Sunday to Monday. All of Switzerland's snow-capped Alpine peaks -- the highest being the 4,634-metre Monte Rosa summit -- had air temperatures over zero Celsius where water freezes to ice, raising prospects of a thaw.
The new high altitude eclipsed a previous record set in July 2022, a year that experts say was particularly devastating for the glaciers of Switzerland. Readings have been taken on the zero-degree altitude level since 1954. "An exceptionally powerful anticyclone and warm air of subtropical origin are currently ensuring scorching weather over the country," MeteoSwiss said on its website, adding that many measuring stations in Switzerland have set new temperature records in the second half of August.
MeteoSwiss meterologist Mikhael Schwander said it marked only the third time such readings had been tallied above 5,000 metres -- and that the level was generally around 3,500 to 4,000 metres in a typical summer. "With a zero-degree isotherm far above 5,000m , all glaciers in the Alps are exposed to melt -- up to their highest altitudes," said Daniel Farinotti, a glaciologist at the federal technical university in Zurich, ETHZ, in an email. "Such events are rare and detrimental to the glaciers' health, as they live from snow being accumulated at high altitudes.
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