A new report published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences has estimated that Mount Kilimanjaro’s glaciers will be gone  within the next 20 year.  Based on aerial photographs and extracts of ice, the authors measured the pace of the glacial retreat to arrive at their time frame.

Scientists have calculated that Kilimanjaro’s ice sheet has shrunk 85% since 1912, with the rate accelerating in recent.  In the last 9 years, the three remaining ice fields have shrunk by 26%.

National Geographic News published some stunning satellite images of Africa last month, courtesy of United Nations Envitonment Program.  One of the images shows the glacial retreat occuring on Mount Kilimanjaro between 1976 and 2006.  It is estimated that the glaciers have decreased by 80% since the early 20th century.

This story follows after a May 1, 2007 National Geographic News article that stated that the earlier predictions of the glaciers disappearing by 2020 were “unrealistic.”  An Austrian-U.S. research team predicted that the ice atop Kilimanjaro would exist for another 30 to 40 years.

Additionally, the team attributes the glacial retreat to lower precipitation, and not global warming.