Science Alert

What they found was “probably about 50-percent worse” than even the most pessimistic estimate of current populations using computer modelling, said Peter Fretwell, who tracks wildlife from space at the British Antarctic Survey (BAS).

Researchers know that climate change is driving the losses but the speed of the declines is a particular cause for alarm.

The study, published in the journal Nature Communications: Earth & Environment, found that numbers declined 22 percent in the 15 years to 2024 for the colonies monitored.

This compares with an earlier estimate of a 9.5-percent reduction across Antarctica as a whole between 2009 and 2018.