KATHMANDU, Sept 17: Climate change has created conditions that contributed to the devastating ice-rock avalanche and subsequent flooding in Rasuwa on September 10 by gradually weakening the high-mountain environment, an international scientific study has found.
The study by World Weather Attribution (WWA), an international research group that scientifically examines disasters linked to climate change, says processes including glacier thinning, thawing permafrost and increased water pressure in cracks in rocks have weakened the Himalayan mountain environment.
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The study, conducted by 24 international scientists who analyzed evidence from fields including glaciology, hydrology, climate science and seismology, says climate change was not the sole cause of the disaster on September 10. However, the scientists concluded that decades of human-induced warming had created a background condition that made the mountain terrain increasingly unstable.
According to the study, the 0°C freezing line in the Himalayas has been moving upward by around 100 meters every decade as temperatures rise. This has kept land and rocks that were previously permanently frozen in warmer and increasingly thawing conditions for longer periods.
Following the ice-rock collapse in the Langtang-Lirung area, an avalanche of ice, debris and large volumes of water swept rapidly downhill. The study describes the disaster as a hazard resulting from complex interactions among climate, geology, ice and water.
The full report is scheduled to be released at 5:45 pm today.
