The Washington Post - USA (2022-03-27)

A24 EZ RE THE WASHINGTON POST.SUNDAY, MARCH 27 , 2022

BY AZIZ EL YAAKOUBI

riyadh — After two days of ex-

changing airstrikes, Yemen’s

Houthi group offered a peace ini-

tiative on Saturday, saying it was

suspending missile and drone

strikes on Saudi Arabia for three

days. The group also announced a

three-day suspension of ground

offensive operations in Yemen, in-

cluding in the gas producing re-

gion of Marib.

The Houthis want the Saudi-led

coalition that it has been battling

in Yemen to stop its airstrikes and

lift port restrictions. Mahdi al-

Mashat, the head of the Houthis’

political office, added during a

speech broadcast on television

that the group was ready to release

all prisoners, including the broth-

er of Yemeni President Abd-Rabbu

Mansour Hadi.

The unilateral initiative came

as violence between the Iran-

aligned group and the Saudi-led

coalition, which have been at war

since 2015, escalated dramatically

this month.

Airstrikes of the Saudi-led co-

alition pounded the Houthi-con-

trolled seaports of Hodeidah and

Salif on Saturday, a day after the

group launched broad attacks on

Saudi Arabia, including on an oil

facility in Jiddah, which caused a

massive fire and sent up a huge

plume of black smoke.

The coalition said it targeted

drones that were being prepared

at the ports, according to state-run

news agency Saudi Press Agency.

It also targeted four boats being

readied for assault at Saleef,

thwarting “an imminent attack on

oil tankers,” SPA said. Three

Houthi experts in booby-trapping

and launching boats were report-

edly killed.

The coalition said the airstrikes

would be ongoing and gave the

Houthis a deadline of three hours

to remove all weapons from the

ports and Sanaa airport.

Tensions in the region have

been rising. Other bombings tar-

geted Saudi Arabia last weekend

and the United Arab Emirates in

January and February.

The United Nations has been

trying to secure a temporary truce

for the Muslim holy month of Ra-

madan, which starts next month,

and ahead of Riyadh’s hosting

Yemeni parties for consultations

later this month.

Lifting restrictions imposed by

the coalition’s warships on the Red

Sea Yemeni ports has been a major

condition from the Houthis for a

cease-fire. Saudi Arabia says there

is no blockade on the ports and it is

only preventing arms smuggling.

Mashat’s i nitiative would last if

the coalition reopened the ports

and stopped its airstrikes. In ex-

change for extending the suspen-

sion of ground offensive opera-

tions, he said Saudi Arabia must

announce a withdrawal of foreign

troops from Yemen and stop sup-

porting local militias.

It is unlikely that the kingdom

would agree to such conditions.

— Reuters

H outhis

suspend

attacks on

Saudi Arabia

BY JASON SAMENOW

An ice shelf larger than New
York City has broken off eastern
Antarctica, the first major shelf
to collapse there in more than
four decades of satellite observa-
tions.
The Conger Ice Shelf, spanning
about 460 square miles, shat-
tered off the continent on March

15. Its disintegration has alarmed
    scientists, who have long consid-
    ered ice in eastern Antarctica as
    relatively stable and far less
    v ulnerable to global warming
    c ompared to ice in western
    A ntarctica.
    Ice shelves surrounding Ant-
    arctica protect ice sheets and

glaciers on the continent. If the

shelves give way, it creates a path

for ice streams from surrounding

glaciers to spill into the ocean

and contribute to sea level rise.

The ice shelves themselves do not

directly lift the sea level because

they’re already floating on the

ocean.

In just the last three weeks, sea

ice levels surrounding the con-

tent dropped to a record low and

temperatures on the interior of

eastern Antarctica shot up 70

degrees above normal, smashing

records.

“We’re seeing these things

sooner than we expected,” said

Peter Neff, assistant research pro-

fessor at the University of Minne-

sota and an expert in glaciology.

Ice loss from Antarctica has

accelerated in recent years —

much of which comes from west-

ern Antarctica — and ranks as a

significant driver of global sea

level rise. What happens in east-

ern Antarctica is particularly im-

portant because if all of its ice

were to melt, it would raise sea

levels by well over 100 feet.

The collapse of the Conger Ice

Shelf occurred at the beginning

of the record-breaking warm

spell in eastern Antarctica.

On March 18, temperatures

rose 50 to 90 degrees above

normal over parts of the East

Antarctic Ice Sheet and rain, a

rare occurrence on the continent,

fell near the coast.

Temperatures near where the

ice shelf broke off began rising

above the melting point right

around the time it separated

from the continent. A weather

station in Casey, Antarctica,

about 300 kilometers from the

Conger Ice Shelf had maximum

temperatures above freezing

from March 15-18.

Neff said the pulse of warmth,

transported over the continent by

an usually intense plume of mois-

ture known as an atmospheric

river, probably played a relatively

small role in the ice shelf’s col-

lapse. But it may have contribut-

ed to its disintegration, he added.

The record low sea ice levels

surrounding Antarctica probably

played a bigger role in hastening

the ice shelf’s demise, Neff said.

The ice extent fell below 2 million

square kilometers on Feb. 25, the

lowest in 43 years of observa-

tions, amid windy and unusually

warm conditions.

Satellite imagery show its dis-

integration evolved over the

course of many years, but that the

recent collapse was rapid.

He described the ice shelf’s

demise as a wake-up call for

scientists studying the region.

“We expect the ice shelves on

the west to be doing this but not

the eastern ones,” he said in a

phone interview. “That’s what got

folks’ attention. We really need to

be more comprehensively track-

ing all of these processes in east

Antarctica. Small mistakes in

eastern Antarctica can lead to big

oversights.”

Neff said that despite the Con-

ger Ice Shelf’s surprising col-

lapse, his primary concern about

Antarctica and its potential to

contribute to dangerous amounts

of sea level rise lies in the west.

West Antarctica “is what will

first cause big problems for ev-

eryone with sea level rise,” he

said.

In December, scientists con-

cluded that an ice shelf on the

periphery of the Thwaites Glacier

in western Antarctica could

break off in the next five years,

accelerating the flow of melt wa-

ter and fueling sea level rise.

Neff said the contribution to

sea level rise from the Conger Ice

Shelf giving way is just a “drop in

the bucket,” relatively speaking.

Compared to western Antarctica,

eastern Antarctica is colder, high-

er, drier and less vulnerable to

rising temperatures.

Even so, Helen Fricker, a pro-

fessor at the Scripps Institution

of Oceanography, said in an email

that ice shelves like Conger “play

an important buttressing role on

the grounded ice sheet behind,

which has implications for sea

level rise.”

“This event shows that it is

important to keep monitoring

around the edges of Antarctica,

where there are significant

changes taking place,” she wrote.

In a TikTok video posted to

Twitter, Neff came to the follow-

ing conclusion: “This is going to

continue happening in a warm-

ing world, so the best thing we

can do is get rid of our fossil fuels,

stop emitting greenhouse gases

and limit the amount of warming

we experience.”

Conger Ice Shelf, larger than NYC, breaks off east Antarctica

NASA/ASSOCIATED PRESS

Scientists are concerned about the March 15 break i n eastern Antarctica, an area that’s long been considered more stable and less vulnerable to global warming than the west.

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