CLIMATE CHANGE: Alaska's ice is melting in front of our eyes, staggering satellite shots show

 Climate change and global warming have been changing the Earth more quickly since the Industrial Revolution. It's a fact. Pollutants are speeding up a changing world climate, and warming it, which is creating extremes (from polar vortex outbreaks to more droughts and floods). Visual proof is seen in these satellite images of Alaska, taken from NASA satellites.  Here's the story.

Caption: NASA satellite image showing melt in Alaska. (Image credit: NASA Earth Observatory/Wanmei Liang)

Alaska's ice is melting in front of our eyes, staggering satellite shots show 

 By Ben Turner, LIVE SCIENCE  February 7, 2025

Unusual weather patterns and climate change have been driving stark changes in the northwestern state. Now, new satellite images show the extent of this transformation.

 New satellite images reveal the stark pace of global warming in Alaska, with last year's snow vanishing and leaving behind miles of bare ground.

The images, taken by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) instrument on NASA's Terra and Aqua satellites, show Bristol Bay Borough in southern Alaska. Anchorage, which is located to the northeast, had an average January snow depth of 13 inches (33 centimeters) between 1998 and 2025.

But this year, the station, alongside other parts of the state, reported next to no snow on the ground. What is left behind are large patches of ground visible from space.

"Since December 2024, temperatures across the state have been 5 to 10 degrees Fahrenheit (3 to 6 degrees Celsius) above normal, according to NOAA, and isolated areas have experienced even greater anomalies," NASA Earth Observatory wrote in a blog post accompanying the new images. "The warm temperatures caused existing snow and ice to melt and new precipitation to fall as rain."

As climate change heats up the planet, Arctic regions such as Alaska are experiencing dramatic rates of warming, with temperatures increasing up to four times faster than the rest of the world. Anchorage's average temperature was 29.3 F (minus 1.5 C) in January — 13 F (7.2 C) above average and warmer than readings taken in three dozen other states.

The reasons for this are twofold. First, unusual weather conditions across the North Pacific fueled a marine heatwave across North America this winter. This warming was worsened in Alaska thanks to a warm, high-pressure ridge of air hanging over the state.