Kilimanjaro's glaciers shrink and crack as scientists warn Africa's highest mountain may soon be ice free

• Kilimanjaro has sustained large quantities of ice for 10,000 years
• Samples show ice has survived multiple periods of abrupt climate change
• Now experts warn that the ice on the mountain could be gone by 2060

The peaks of Mount Kilimanjaro, the world's highest free-standing mountain, may soon be ice free, scientists warn.
Between 1912 and 2011, the mass of ice on the summit of the 19,341ft dormant stratovolcano in Tanzania decreased by more than 85 per cent, say researchers with Nasa's Earth Observatory.
Kimberly Casey, a glaciologist based at the U.S. space agency's Goddard Space Flight Centre, who visited the mountain earlier this year, also noticed Kilimanjaro's north ice field had separated.

Shrinking: The ice fields of Kilimanjaro as pictured by the Advanced Land Imager on NASA's Earth Observing-1 satellite. In 100 years the mountain the amount of ice on the mountain has decreased by 85 per cent

The glacier had been developing a hole since the Seventies, but this is the first year in which it had been seen to divide in two. 'We were able to walk on land — or we could have even ridden a bicycle — directly through the rift,' Dr Casey said.
Scientists now warn it’s no longer a question of whether Kilimanjaro's ice will disappear, but when. Estimates vary, but several scientists predict it will be gone by 2060.
The views from the top of Mount Kilimanjaro are as surreal as they are spectacular.
After ascending through multiple ecosystems — including cropland, lush rainforest, alpine desert, and a virtual dead zone near the summit — climbers can find themselves peering down on a thick blanket of clouds below that seems to stretch endlessly in the distance.
But in the immediate foreground, ice dominates the view. Looking north, a shelf-like block of ice with a sharp vertical cliff sits on an otherwise featureless, sand-covered plateau.
In the other direction, a second ice field spills off the edge of the plateau, down the mountain’s southern face.

Kilimanjaro's southern ice field: Despite Mount Kilimanjaro's location in the tropics, the dry and cold air at the top of the mountain has sustained large quantities of ice for more than 10,000 years

'We could have ridden a bicycle through the rift': Kimberly Casey, a Nasa glaciologist, who visited the mountain earlier this year, noticed Kilimanjaro's north ice field had separated

Despite Mount Kilimanjaro’s location in the tropics, the dry and cold air at the top of the mountain has sustained large quantities of ice for more than 10,000 years.
At points, ice has completely surrounded the crater. Studies of ice core samples show that Kilimanjaro’s ice has persisted through multiple warm spells, droughts, and periods of abrupt climate change.
Rising air temperatures due to global warming could be contributing to the ice loss, researchers say, but a number of other factors are just as important, if not more so.
An increasingly dry regional atmosphere, for example, is starving the mountain of the fresh snow needed to sustain the ice fields.
Drier air is also reducing cloud cover and allowing more solar energy to warm the ice surfaces.
Dr Casey visited Kilimanjaro as part of a research expedition in September this year.