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Watch a Huge Serac Fall in New Zealand

Ryan Taylor videoed this serac collapse during a ski mountaineering trip to Mount Cook.

“I also captured a series of ice the size of several buildings falling off the Hochstetter Ice Fall below Mount Cook,” wrote Taylor on social media.

“Similar events are naturally occurring several times a day (at 13 seconds in the video you can see a similar, smaller collapse in the background of the video), but it is evident climate change is causing glaciers to recede at an unprecedented rate.

“New Zealand’s first ski area was once located on the Ball Glacier below Cook, which is now covered in rock debris. I assume with increasing average temperatures we are seeing more melting and consequently an increasing ratio of rainfall to snowfall in the accumulation areas of glaciers.

“It is important to raise awareness around climate change at this time with the international conference on climate change in Paris coming up. For those who don’t care about the glaciers disappearing it has potential to effect economies through loss of tourism and means less water available for irrigation.”

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