Around the world, glaciers and permafrost are melting, and in some places the retreating ice is releasing buried secrets that people hoped would remain forgotten.
Rising water levels have exposed a secret Greenland nuclear base that engineers thought would never resurface, as well as a radioactive “grave” at the site of US nuclear tests.
And while it may seem far-fetched, very credible experts have warned that the next pandemic could well come from ancient pathogens buried in the ice, or even from diseases harbored by frozen dead Neanderthals.
The ‘secret nuclear city’ under the Greenland ice
Camp Century in Greenland is a secret nuclear-powered “city under the ice” where U.S. Army engineers conducted weapons research.
The base has been abandoned for almost half a century
Camp Century’s waste legacy could resurface
When the Army Corps of Engineers (ACE) abandoned the base, they assumed that the frigid temperatures and snow would keep the nuclear waste there forever.
The base has been abandoned for almost half a century, but now raises serious concerns about nuclear waste.
Powered by a portable nuclear generator, Camp Century was built in 1959 and had the capacity to house 200 soldiers, with a plan to expand the base to house 600 ballistic missiles.
‘Camp Century’ was abandoned in 1967, but the base’s nuclear reactor, which also had a hospital and a church in its tunnels, has long since been removed, but radioactive waste still remains.
When the Army Corps of Engineers (ACE) abandoned the base, they assumed that the frigid temperatures and snow would keep the nuclear waste there forever.
In total, the debris is equivalent to the mass of 30 Airbus A320 planes and now researchers fear it could be dumped into the sea.
A 2016 study suggested that nuclear waste could be released into the sea this century, but more recent measurements at the base suggest this will not happen until 2100.
Poison ‘grave’ at nuclear test site
In the Marshall Islands, a huge “lid” known to locals as “The Tomb” covers 31 million cubic feet of nuclear waste, equivalent to the volume of 35 Olympic-sized swimming pools.
The islands were the site of US nuclear tests, but the US military also shipped waste from the mainland.
The islands were the site of American nuclear tests.
The islands were the site of American nuclear tests.
From 1946 to 1958, the United States conducted 67 nuclear tests in the South Pacific.
The concrete “lid” officially known as Runit Dome was built on Enewetak Atoll in the Marshall Islands to contain radioactive material from US nuclear tests in the 1950s.
Some studies have suggested that radiation levels near the site are similar to those at Chernobyl and that the waters around the dome are rising each year.
Temperature changes are causing the lid to crack, while rising water hits the atoll.
Plutonium… and a lost hydrogen bomb?
A plane crash in 1968 spread plutonium from US nuclear weapons onto the Greenland ice, which could be released due to global warming.
The U.S. military assumed that Thule Air Base in Greenland would be quickly attacked in a nuclear war, so it kept nuclear-armed bombers in the air to fly toward Russia in the event of an attack.
In the Thule incident, large amounts of radioactive plutonium were scattered over the ice sheet.
In the Thule incident, large amounts of radioactive plutonium were scattered over the ice sheet.
In the Thule incident, large quantities of radioactive plutonium were dispersed over the ice sheet, when a fire in the cockpit of a B-52 bomber forced the crew to retreat.
The conventional explosives inside the four B28FI thermonuclear bombs detonated, spreading radioactive waste.
But the fissile uranium-235 core from one of the bombs was never found, despite a submarine search.
Reports in the decades since have suggested that the missing bomb lies beneath the seabed.
Frozen viruses and the next pandemic
Researchers have warned that the next pandemic could come from melting ice.
Genetic analysis of soil and lake sediments near the Arctic’s highest freshwater lake, Lake Hazen, suggests that the risk of “viral spillover” may be high near melting glaciers.
Could ‘zombie’ viruses infect the human race? (Getty)
“Spillover” is when a virus infects a new host for the first time, and analysis of viruses and potential hosts on the lake bed suggests this risk may be greatest near melting glaciers.
Researchers at Ohio State University found genetic material from 33 viruses, 28 of which were unknown, on China’s Tibetan Plateau, putting their age at 15,000 years.
Neanderthal viruses
Other researchers have warned of viruses unleashed by melting permafrost: A quarter of the northern hemisphere lies on permanently frozen ground, known as permafrost, but large areas are now melting as the world warms.
There are already examples of this: an anthrax outbreak in Siberia in 2016 attributed to melting permafrost that exposed an infected reindeer carcass.
Virologist Jean-Michel Claverie has warned that ancient viruses harbored in frozen soil for a long time could be released.
Previously, researchers had warned that global warming and melting ice could unearth diseases like smallpox frozen in victims’ corpses, with just a few infectious particles enough to revive the pathogen.
As permafrost melts due to climate change, virologist Jean-Michel Claverie has warned that ancient viruses long harbored in frozen soil could be released.
Claverie explains that if an ancient pathogen eradicated Neanderthals, for example, their frozen remains could still contain infectious viruses that could be released when the ice melts.
Claverie told Bloomberg News: “With climate change, we are used to thinking about dangers coming from the south.
“We now realize there could be some danger coming from the north as the permafrost melts and releases microbes, bacteria and viruses.”
Claverie’s team previously revived giant viruses from up to 48,000 years ago, and the veteran scientist warned that there could be even older viruses in the ice, some of which could potentially infect humans.
Poison frozen in ice.
The polar regions have acted as a “chemical sink” for the planet, locking poisons in the ice, but melting ice could release them.
A study published in Geophysical Research Letters found huge reserves of the toxic heavy metal mercury frozen in the Arctic permafrost.
The amount may be 10 times greater than all the mercury pumped into the atmosphere by industry in three decades.
Paul Schuster, a hydrologist with the US Geological Survey, “This is a game-changer for mercury. It’s a natural source, but some of it will be released through what we’re doing with climate change.”
Mercury is released by industry, volcanic eruptions and rock erosion, but what is less clear is what will happen if the Arctic ‘puddle’ is released.