Samples of the Earth's core – up to nine million years old, have been opened today – telling the story of an Antarctic tipping point.
A team of international scientists have gathered in Dunedin to analyse evidence of when ice melted in the past, to predict future sea level rise.
Professor Richard Levy from Earth Sciences New Zealand and Victoria University said it was like "opening many, many, many, very expensive Christmas presents".
The samples were collected in one of the world's most remote sites in West Antarctica last summer, 700km from Scott Base, and flown back to New Zealand.
Earth Science's New Zealand Antarctic operations manager Paddy Power said: "Just getting them here, actually, just like in terms of pressure and knowing that they were safe, it was massive.”
After the samples landed, he said: “I could actually breathe and start to relax a little bit more."
The samples were extracted from under 500m of ice and 200m of bedrock.
The layers of sediments and fossils show when ice has frozen and melted in the past, and at what temperatures.
The core extractions were a world-first – so a team of international scientists met at the University of Otago today to analyse them.
Levy said: "We've warmed by 1.2, maybe 1.5 degrees above what temperatures were prior to the Industrial Revolution, and we're really concerned about what that warming will do to the ice sheet."
If the West Antarctic ice sheet completely melted, global sea levels could rise by four to five metres – and the experts want to understand how close we are to the tipping point.
"What we don't know is whether it's one degree, one and a half degrees or two degrees warmer that will cause the ice shelf to collapse. Or maybe it will stay," Levy said.
Two past attempts to retrieve the samples failed, with the technology to finally achieve it decades in the making.
Professor Rob McKay from Te Herenga Waka - Victoria University Antarctic Research Centre said: "We've been drilling through the Antarctic ice shelves and sea ice for 50 years, but this is the first time we had to go to a very remote region and drill beneath the heart of the Antarctic ice sheet itself."
Antarctica's history will continue to be dissected in Dunedin, and some pieces will be flown overseas again to other international experts, for the next 10 days.
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