New Look for Tanzania

Posted by Jessica Sims on Friday, November 06, 2009

Global warming has targeted yet another iconic image in our world - the snow caps of Kilimanjaro.

The traditionally white peak is disappearing fast, so fast that in another 25 years the mountain's entire ice field could disappear.

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences published a report this week saying that 85 per cent of the ice Kilimanjaro had in 1912 was gone by 2007. Just over a quarter of the loss has occurred since 2000.

Both northern and southern glaciers are not only losing size, they're losing thickness too.

Kilimanjaro is a popular spot for tourists because it is one of the world's most accessible mountain peaks, requiring little to no mountain climbing equipment or previous experience.

Ernest Hemingway once described Africa's tallest mountain "as wide as all the world, great, high and unbelievably white." A fitting description then, this might no longer be the case.