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  • What if a dramatic surge of climate change melted all the Earth's ice overnight?

  • Would you wake up to find yourself drowning under water?

  • Would most of your country be submerged?

  • How would you enjoy slowly choking to death?

  • This is WHAT IF, and here's what would happen if all the world's ice melted.

  • Ever watched an ice cube melt in a glass of water that's filled to the brim?

  • How does it change the water level?

  • The truth is, it doesn't.

  • Above or below the water line, a melted ice cube replaces exactly the same volume of water.

  • Now let's add salt to the mix.

  • In the case of a 1-cubic-inch ice cube, the water level in the glass will rise by 0.03 cubic inches.

  • That rise is displaced salt water.

  • It's an increase in volume of nearly 3%.

  • Fairly small amount, isn't it?

  • But what if you apply this to glaciers and floating sea ice?

  • 5.8 million square miles of our planet is covered with ice.

  • If all of it were to melt overnight, the global sea level would rise approximately 230 feet.

  • That's enough to cover London's Tower Bridge.

  • All seven continents would be partially underwater.

  • There would be no Miami and no London.

  • The coast of Australia would be washed out, together with 80% of its residents.

  • So would Venice and the Netherlands.

  • Things wouldn't be that bad for Africa.

  • But with the extreme heat waves that followed, most of the continent would be uninhabitable.

  • Think floods would wash out humanity entirely?

  • Well, not all of it.

  • But whoever is left will have plenty of dangers to deal with.

  • All that melted ice would release carbon dioxide into the air.

  • Ice needs high CO2 concentrations to melt in the first place.

  • Given that oxygen content in the atmosphere would remain the same, you would slowly start to choke from breathing the air.

  • You'd have very little time to acclimatize to the new world.

  • Ocean currents would change their direction, affecting sea life.

  • With no time to evolve to such extreme changes, sea creatures and polar animals would face massive extinction.

  • The ones still alive would have to leave their homes and find a better place to live.

  • This would result in a decrease of human food supply.

  • A change in sea current would also mean dramatic weather changes.

  • Heavy rains would hit the desert, and areas with a significant rainfall would dry out.

  • This would devastate agriculture and cause a global famine.

  • Wind patterns would change, too.

  • With no ice to reflect the sun's rays, the sun would draw more moisture from the oceans, making more clouds in the sky.

  • The clouds would gather first near the mountain areas, and eventually rainfall would flood them.

  • Oceanic hurricanes would occur more often, causing even more floods.

  • Even the smallest earthquake off the coast could devastate nearby regions with a massive tsunami.

  • All of this would force a global migration that governments would not be able to deal with.

  • The world as we know it would collapse.

  • Luckily, all the ice can't melt overnight.

  • But it is melting.

  • Even the oldest ice core that has been storing information about Earth's climate for 1.5 million years.

  • If we keep adding fuel to the climate change fire, in 5,000 years, the Earth will be ice-free.

What if a dramatic surge of climate change melted all the Earth's ice overnight?

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