Mourn for First Icelandic Glacier Lost

Scientists bid farewell to Okjökul, Iceland’s first glacier to disappear as the world warms at an unprecedented rate. Many Icelandic officials, activists and researchers came together for a funeral on Sunday and demand action towards fighting climate change.
 

A memorial plaque was installed at the site warning that “in the next 200 years all our glaciers are expected to follow the same path.”
“This monument is to acknowledge that we know what is happening and what needs to be done. Only you know if we did it,” the plaque’s inscription added.
The mock funeral included a poetry reading, moments of silence and political speeches. Attendees held up signs calling climate change a crisis and urging world leaders to declare it an emergency.
The funeral comes just days after scientists confirmed July was the Earth’s warmest month ever recorded and Greenland’s massive ice sheet experienced a “major melting event” that resulted in the loss of billions of tons of ice.
Around 100 people walked up to the mountain for the ceremony, including Iceland’s prime minister, Katrin Jakobsdottir, former UN human rights commissioner, Mary Robinson, and local researchers and colleagues from the United States from who pioneered the commemoration project.
Icelandic Prime Minister Katrín Jakobsdóttir said, “We have no time to lose.” The former Irish President Mary Robinson also issued a statement and said, “The symbolic death of a glacier is a warning to us, and we need action.”
>Juthy Saha