A British couple’s photographs from a beautiful spot in the Swiss Alps taken 15 years apart have gone viral after they showed the astounding impact of climate change melting a glacier.
Duncan Porter and his wife Helen posted their time-travelling travel snaps on X showing the pair standing at the same location by a railing overlooking the Rhône Glacier high in the mountains of central Switzerland.
The glacier is one of main feeders of water for Lake Geneva. In the older image, almost the entire mountain valley is filled with a huge river of ice hundreds of feet high.
But in the second photo, which Mr Porter said was taken nearly 15 years after the original one, the glacier seems to have virtually disappeared leaving behind a large pool of grey water in the foreground.
Only in the far distance can the remainder of the geographical feature be seen. Mr Porter poignantly captioned the photo: “Fifteen years minus one day between these photos. Taken at the Rhone glacier in Switzerland today. Not gonna lie, it made me cry.”
Since posting their holiday snaps on X on August 4, the image has gone viral and had more than 4.3 million views on the social media platform.
Speaking to the Guardian, Helen Porter, a nurse, said the couple had planned to recreate their old photo at the same location, but she said: “Obviously the circumstance of this photo was drastically different, I thought it was really unbelievable.”
Mr Porter said the change at the glacier was something “supposed to happen over really long time periods” and that “people should focus on is the speed of change”.
The Rhône Glacier has been drastically retreating in recent decades, so much so that authorities have taken to covering several acres of the ice sheet with “UV-resistant white blankets” to stem the tide of melting.
The huge body of ice is located in the Swiss region, or canton, of Valais, situated between the Grimsel Pass and the Furka Pass. Overlooking the glacier is the Dammastock, a mountain rising to a summit at around 11,000 feet.
According to Glacier Monitoring Switzerland (GLAMOS), the landlocked mountainous country has lost 10 percent of its glaciers in just the past two years, caused by higher summer temperatures and low winter snowfall.
Matthias Huss, who leads GLAMOS, told Sky News: “This year was very problematic for glaciers because there was really little snow in winter, and the summer was very warm.
“The combination of these two factors is the worst that can happen to glaciers.”