Unmapped Wilkes Subglacial Basin in Antarctica may destabilize, study warns

A study in Nature Reviews Earth & Environment warns that East Antarctica's Wilkes Subglacial Basin, long considered stable, could retreat rapidly as the climate warms. Its ice holds enough water to raise global sea levels by 3 to 4 meters, with retreat potentially reaching 1 kilometer per year.

• Wilkes Basin ice could raise global sea levels by 3 to 4 meters
• Retreat may reach about 1 kilometer per year past pinning points
• Cook Glacier loses roughly 40 billion tonnes of ice annually since the 1990s
• The 1,400-km basin remains largely unexplored with no seafloor mapping