MIS 11, the long warm one
The longest and possibly warmest interglacial of the last half-million years runs for 50,000 years.
- When
- —
- Duration
- 50 thousand years
- Known to
- ± 5 thousand years
- Era
- Middle Pleistocene, Quaternary
Marine Isotope Stage 11, from about 424,000 to 374,000 years ago, is exceptional: an interglacial roughly twice the usual length, with sea level several metres above present, implying substantial loss from Greenland and West Antarctica. Because its orbital configuration was also weakly forced — like the Holocene's — it is used as a second analogue for the current interglacial's likely duration, and as a case study in how much ice can melt at only moderately elevated warmth.