“Will the glaciers melt?” Nepal’s catastrophic floods fuel fears across the Andes

After Nepal’s devastating landslides and floods, concern is spreading across the Andes that glacier melt could produce similar disasters in Argentina, Chile and Peru.

Scientists and geologists say global warming has left Andean glaciers unstable. As the ice retreats, unstable lakes are forming rapidly and the surrounding ground is becoming loose rock that can collapse more easily. Even with monitoring and early-warning systems, experts warn that a glacial-lake flood could move quickly and reach a destructive scale that would be difficult to manage.

Many people live close to the Andes in Argentina, Chile and Peru, putting them directly in the path of potential glacier-related flooding. Juan Pablo Milana, a researcher at Argentina’s National Scientific and Technical Research Council, told the local outlet Infobae that “what happened in Nepal has already happened in Argentina.”

Milana pointed to a lake collapse in San Juan province in November 2005. More than 3,100 cubic metres of water poured out in just 67 minutes, he said, sending a flood 250 kilometres through the area and destroying crops and roads.

Chile, which has 26,000 glaciers, is considered one of the countries most exposed to glacial-lake outbursts. Rapid retreat in the Patagonian ice fields is creating many unstable lakes, while central Chile’s concentration of hydropower plants and mining facilities adds to the potential danger. Peru has 528 lakes considered at risk of flooding, including 58 classified as high risk. In the northern Ancash region, home to 1.2 million people, the entire urban area lies within the potential influence of melting Andean glaciers.

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What happened in Nepal has already happened in Argentina.