Tracking sea ice is ‘early warning system’ for global heating – but the US is halting data sharing

News comes as research finds record lows of Antarctic sea ice had seen more icebergs splintering off ice shelves

Scientists analysing the cascading impacts of record low levels of Antarctic sea ice fear a loss of critical US government satellite data will make it harder to track the rapid changes taking place at both poles.

Researchers around the globe were told last week the US Department of Defence will stop processing and providing the data, used in studies on the state of Arctic and Antarctic sea ice, at the end of this month.