Climate Change
While this phenomenon is not new, having occurred for the majority of the twentieth century, it is now occurring at a faster rate. Some scientists anticipate that the ice will entirely melt in the foreseeable future. As a result, they've gone to great lengths to figure out why the ice fields are disappearing. In the year 2000, a team lead by Ohio State University geologist Lonnie Thompson traveled to the Kilimanjaro slopes in search of answers.
The Expedition
Thompson and his colleagues spent more than a month sleeping on Mount Kilimanjaro in order to harvest ice cores from the mountain. However, obtaining the samples proved to be far more difficult than they had anticipated. Gathering them immediately developed into a logistical nightmare. The scientists had to overcome numerous severe challenges before they could even collect the ice samples.