Record melt: Greenland lost 586 billion tonnes of ice in 2019
Nuuk: Greenland lost a record amount of ice during an extra warm 2019, with the melt massive enough to cover California in more than four feet of water, a new study said.
After two years when summer ice melt had been minimal, last summer shattered all records with 586 billion tons (532 billion metric tons) of ice melting, according to satellite measurements reported in a study Thursday.
That's more than 140 trillion gallons (532 trillion litres) of water.
That's far more than the yearly average loss of 259 billion tons (235 billion metric tons) since 2003 and easily surpasses the old record of 511 billion tons (464 billion metric tons) in 2012, said a study in Nature Communications Earth & Environment. The study showed that in the 20th century, there were many years when Greenland gained ice.
Not only is the Greenland ice sheet melting, but it's melting at a faster and faster pace, said study lead author Ingo Sasgen, a geoscientist at the Alfred Wegener Institute in Germany.
Last year's Greenland melt added 0.06 inches (1.5 millimeters) to global sea level rise.
That sounds like a tiny amount but in our world it's huge, that's astounding, said study co-author Alex Gardner, a NASA ice scientist. Add in more water from melting in other ice sheets and glaciers, along with an ocean that expands as it warms - and that translates into slowly rising sea levels, coastal flooding and other problems, he said.
While general ice melt records in Greenland go back to 1948, scientists since 2003 have had precise records on how much ice melts because NASA satellites measure the gravity of the ice sheets. That's the equivalent of putting the ice on a scale and weighing it as water flows off, Gardner said.
As massive as the melt was last year, the two years before were only on average about 108 billion tons (98 billion metric tons). That shows that there's a second factor called Greenland blocking, that either super-charges that or dampens climate-related melting, Gardner said.
In the summer, there are generally two factors in Greenland's weather, Gardner said. Last year, Greenland blocking - a high pressure over Canada that changes the northern jet stream - caused warm southern air to come up from the United States and Canada and flow into Greenland, forcing more melting.
In 2017 and 2018 without Greenland blocking, cooler Arctic air flowed from open ocean into Greenland, making summer milder, he said.
This year, Greenland's summer melt has been not as severe, closer to normal for recent times, said Ruth Mottram, an ice scientist at the Danish Meteorological Institute, who wasn't part of Sasgen's research.
Mottram and several other outside scientists said Sasgen's calculations make sense. In her own study this month in the International Journal of Climatology, she found similar results and also calculated that Greenland coastal regions have warmed on average 3 degrees (1.7 degrees Celsius) in the summer since 1991.
The fact that 2019 set an all-time record is very concerning, said New York University ice scientist David Holland, who wasn't part of either study.
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Karnataka MLA Vinay Kulkarni disqualified after conviction in Goudar murder case
Bengaluru (PTI): The Karnataka Legislative Assembly on Saturday issued an official notification regarding the disqualification of Congress MLA Vinay Kulkarni following his conviction in the murder case of BJP leader Yogeshgouda Goudar.
The former minister is currently in prison, serving life imprisonment in the case.
“Consequent upon the conviction of Vinay Kulkarni, Member of the Karnataka Legislative Assembly representing the Dharwad constituency, by the LXXXI Additional City Civil & Sessions Judge, Bengaluru City (CCH-82), in Spl CC No. 565/2021, he stands disqualified from the membership of the Karnataka Legislative Assembly from the date of conviction, i.e, April 15, 2026,” the notification read.
“He stands disqualified in terms of the provisions of Article 191(1)(e) of the Constitution of India, read with Section 8 of the Representation of the People Act, 1951, and such disqualification shall continue for a further period of six years after his release, unless the conviction is stayed by a competent court,” it added.
Hence, one seat in the Karnataka Legislative Assembly has fallen vacant, the notification said.
Bypolls were held on April 9 to fill two other seats in the 224-member Assembly that fell vacant due to the death of sitting MLAs. The results will be declared on May 4.
On April 15, Judge Santhosh Gajanan Bhat convicted Kulkarni and others under various IPC sections, including criminal conspiracy and murder. Subsequently, on April 17, the court sentenced Kulkarni and 15 others convicted in the case to life imprisonment.
The case pertains to the killing of Goudar, a BJP Zilla Panchayat member, in Dharwad on June 15, 2016. Kulkarni was a minister at that time. Hired assailants attacked and hacked Goudar to death in his gym at Saptapur in Dharwad.
Following demands from Goudar’s family and others, the then-BJP government transferred the case to the CBI in 2019.
The CBI filed a supplementary chargesheet in 2020, naming Vinay Kulkarni as the “main conspirator.” It alleged that he perceived Yogeshgouda Goudar as a growing political rival in Dharwad and hired contract killers to eliminate him.
Kulkarni was arrested by the CBI in 2020. He was granted bail by the Supreme Court in August 2021 under certain conditions, including a ban on entering Dharwad district. However, in June 2025, the apex court cancelled his bail following allegations of witness tampering and attempts to influence prosecution witnesses.
Kulkarni again sought bail in January 2026, but the High Court rejected it, citing judicial propriety.
However, the Supreme Court granted him bail on February 27 after noting that all witnesses had been examined.
