Search engine giant, Google, is celebrating World Earth Day 2022 with a time-lapse doodle that demonstrates the effect of climate change around four different locations on the planet over a few decades.
The doodle significantly points to one of the most topical issues of concern of our times; climate change. Warmer temperatures are altering weather patterns and upsetting nature’s natural balance leaving humans and all other kinds of life on Earth at risk as a result.
Every year on April 22, World Earth Day is commemorated, a practice that began in 1970. The official theme for this year is “Invest In Our Planet”, with a focus on encouraging individuals, businesses, and world leaders to invest and switch to greener technologies and practices.
The climate crisis poses the greatest health hazard to humankind as data by the WHO show that more than 13 million deaths each year are attributable to environmental causes.
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The doodle which is in GIF format was created using Google Earth’s real time-lapse imagery and photographs from other sources.
Each time-lapse focuses on a different scene and region for a few hours and shows varying levels of devastation done to these different regions of the Earth at the times of record that are displayed.
“Each individual snapshot from across the planet tells a small part of the story. We’ve seen melting ice, changing lakes, intense fires, and increasing storms. It can be tempting to think of each of these things as an isolated incident, but let’s take a final step back and look at our whole planet,” a note attached to the real imagery titled ‘Rising Temperatures, A Global Perspective’ read.
“We can see in the video how extreme temperatures are becoming increasingly common around the world. The global climate is changing as we watch.”
Two of the time-lapses show glacial melting, though in separate places. The first depicts the retreat of glaciers at Mt Kilimanjaro’s top in Tanzania from 1986 to 2020, while the second depicts reduced ice covering and melted glaciers in Sermersooq, Greenland, from 2000 to 2020.
