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"Antarctica is experiencing some of the fastest warming in the world. Antarctica is cooling.

"Some of its glaciers are thinning. Some are thickening. Ice shelves are disappearing. More sea ice is forming.

"Scientists have reported all this in recent months. It may all be true, even the contradictory parts.

"The reason is that Antarctica is not a single, simple place. At 5.4 million square miles, it is one-third larger than the United States, and just as the Midwest may experience a heat wave while the Northeast is unusually cool, climate does not move in lock step across Antarctica. Those warning of dire consequences from global warming and those playing down the dangers of heat-trapping greenhouse gases can both find pieces of data to support their views.

"In 1995, researchers started noticing the disintegration of the Larsen Ice Shelf, on the northeastern side of the Antarctic Peninsula, when the northernmost section, known as Larsen A, shattered into shards. In 1998, the middle portion, Larsen B, started shrinking, losing 1,000 square miles over four years.

"Then, in February, a 1,250-square-mile section — larger than Rhode Island — started splintering, and in just over a month, it was gone, sending billions of tons of ice floating into the ocean to melt. Scientists expect the remaining nub of Larsen B and C, the last section of the shelf, to fall apart in the coming years.

"In a core of sediments taken from the sea floor that was once covered by the Larsen A Ice Shelf, researchers led by Dr. Eugene W. Domack, a professor of geology at Hamilton College in Clinton, N.Y., found the tiny fossils of marine algae. The finding indicates that this part of the ice shelf had been open water at least once before. The shelf probably melted about 6,000 years ago in a previous warm spell, Dr. Domack said, and remained open water until refreezing during the Little Ice Age about 700 years ago, then remained frozen until it fell apart in 1995.

"Under the Larsen B, however, the researchers found no algae remains in the sediments, indicating that this shelf had remained intact since it formed during the last full-fledged ice age, more than 10,000 years ago, until its demise last month."

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