Elfrida Natkime, an Amungme environmental activist, says she feels both wonder and loss each time she looks at the mountain her people revere. “How would Muslims feel if Mecca were destroyed? How would Catholics feel if Rome or the Vatican were destroyed? For the Amungme people, that is what it feels like when Nemangkawi is destroyed,” she told the BBC.
The white caps of Papua’s Sudirman Range, long known to locals as Mbainggela or Nemangkawi, are now all but gone, according to reporting by the BBC. The island’s famous “eternal snow” has retreated dramatically, leaving only small patches of ice around Puncak Jaya, also known as Carstensz Pyramid.
Scientists and explorers quoted in the BBC report say the glaciers that once covered the Sudirman Range have shrunk sharply. Glacier cover around Puncak Jaya declined from nearly 1,900 hectares in the 19th century to about 16 hectares today, the article reported. Danish researcher Klaus Thymann told the BBC that from the early 2000s to 2025 the glaciated area receded by about 95 percent.
Researchers warn the remaining ice may vanish within a year or two. Marie Šabacká, a Czech glacier ecologist who visited Puncak Jaya in March, described the loss as unfair and unique, because Papua’s tropical glaciers are isolated from other ice fields by thousands of kilometres. She told the BBC that Papua contains the “last remaining tropical ice” between the Andes and the Himalayas.
The BBC report relays scientists’ explanation for the retreat. Šabacká said the changes are driven by a warming atmosphere linked to human activities, including the burning of fossil fuels. As temperatures rise, the freezing level climbs, so precipitation that once fell as snow increasingly falls as rain. She also noted that El Nino events and local factors such as cloud cover, snowfall and mountain topography can accelerate ice loss.
Beyond the scientific value of the ice, the glaciers hold cultural meaning for at least five Indigenous groups, the BBC says. The Moni people call the range Mbainggela and see it as a place where ancestors watch over the mountain. The Amungme call the range Nemangkawi, the “White Arrow,” the BBC reported. A young Amungme woman told the BBC, “Parents and grandparents prayed their children would have hearts like the White Arrow, never straying from the proper path.”
The BBC reported that the discovery of copper and gold deposits and the expansion of extractive projects changed parts of the landscape during the 20th century. These developments have brought jobs and infrastructure for some, while others have lost access to ancestral lands, the article said. The BBC approached Freeport, operator of the Grasberg mine, for comment.
Scientists are racing to document what remains. Thymann and his team used drones and three-dimensional mapping to record the current ice cover, and researchers are extracting ice cores while they still can, the BBC reports. Thymann told the BBC, “There’s almost no ice left. Those are the facts.” Šabacká said the loss removed both a biological habitat and a landscape that holds cultural meaning.
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