Olympic athletes are voicing urgent concerns about the accelerating melt of the world's glaciers. Skiers like Team USA's Mikaela Shiffrin and Lindsey Vonn, alongside Italy's Federica Brignone, note that glaciers once visible near the Olympic host city of Cortina have dramatically shrunk, with many reduced to residual ice patches.
These top athletes train on glaciers for their high-quality snow, but a warming world jeopardizes the future of their sport. Lindsey Vonn shared, “Most of the glaciers that I used to ski on are pretty much gone. So that’s very real and it’s very apparent to us.” Mikaela Shiffrin added that athletes have a "front-row view" of monumental changes and that the fate of their sport is "a little bit of a question."
Italian glaciologists confirm the alarming trend. Since the late 1950s, Italy has lost over 200 square kilometers of glacier area, with a clear acceleration in the last one to two decades. Glaciers around Cortina have shrunk by approximately one-third since the late 1950s.
The loss of glaciers has far-reaching consequences, threatening water sources, increasing mountain hazards, and contributing to sea level rise. The Marmolada glacier, once one of Italy's largest, has been halved in the last 25 years and is projected to be mostly gone by 2034 if warming continues unchecked.
Experts emphasize that immediate reductions in greenhouse gas emissions are crucial. The choices made this decade will determine the amount of ice remaining globally. Many Olympic skiers echo these sentiments, with some advocating for efforts to stop fossil fuel companies from sponsoring winter sports.