Global warming yet again comes to news as it has been for the past soo many years and there’s gonna be nothing we are going to do about it once again. Even then, as a moral duty, I feel this compelling desire to inform all of my fellow malefactors of the supplementary and thoroughly under-appreciated results of our activities.

Let’s bestow upon them our much needed, though short term, attention. Today, I read on the newspaper about how the Ladakh glaciers are retreating due to global warming and decreased winter precipitation and that the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC)- a prominent warm ocean current belt particularly important for Europe and by extension, the whole earth has weakened over the centuries and reached a tipping point.

Lets start with the issue of the Ladakh Glacier. “The Pensilungpa Glacier located in Ladakh’s Zanskar Valley is retreating due to an increase in temperature and a decrease in precipitation during winters”, a recent study conducted by a team of scientists from the Wadia Institute of Himalayan Geology(Dehradun) revealed. Now with the increasing temperatures and retreating glaciers, it might be very well possible for the current snowfall in those areas to be replaced with rainfall: the snowfall that is responsible for balancing temperature of the lower altitude zones. It is now very much a possibility that the summer and winter patterns of surrounding regions are very much likely to be changed. We might very well be having winter rains real soon people, and floods.

And now, lets move towards the AMOC- The Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation-a result of difference in the water’s density(caused due to temperature and salinity difference). Well, that plus the combined effort of continental boundaries and Coriolis force(due to gravity). A large system of ocean currents, it is quite prominent in the Atlantic ocean. It is quite easily recognizable with the northward flow of warm, salty(salt dissolving capability increases with temperature. In colder regions, after being provided a sufficient time to cool off, these waters descend as denser and cold waters) water in the upper layers and a southward flow of colder, deep waters. Global warming is one of the main reasons of the slowing down of this current, contributing by causing the Arctic circle to warm, Greenland(a prominent ice sheet zone) to melt, rainfall to increase and the flow of fresh water to the Northern sea to intensify(It initially had high salinity due to no fresh water river drainage and less intermixing caused by ocean currents). Though, it is being said the rising temperature of the Indian ocean will keep the current going. The increased precipitation in the Indian ocean will draw winds from other parts of the world, lowering the amount of rainfall in the Atlantic ocean. It will increase the salinity of the AMOC current waters and increase the strength of the flow of current.

Seems like the global warming is creating a problem and further creating another one with the purpose of solving the first one and somehow completely increasing both the problems together. Wait, replace the global warming with humans. Quite amusing, how we managed to create a string of issues and now they are finding more and more beads to stitch, and we sit by and watch it all unfold. Well, not all of us, obviously. Most of us don’t even know of these unique products of our everyday activities. But, now that we are at it, we will let them know and invite, or rather force them all to join us in the midst of the unfolding of a future disaster, as we all sit by and do nothing.

I have started this chain, would be later adding more to it. You all share it. After all, the more the merrier. Right?