Space and Upper Atmosphere Research Commission (Suparco) said in a press release that the latest assessment was based on temporal satellite imagery, with the the latest image acquired on Aug 5. All identified lakes were mapped on optical satellite imagery to estimate their surface area and to determine whether they were frozen or unfrozen, it noted.

The space agency said that, as expected with rising summer temperatures, the number of unfrozen glacial lakes had increased.

“At present, 105 lakes are observed to be unfrozen, compared with 40 lakes reported earlier. The current assessment also indicates temporal variation in extent, where few lakes have exceeded their previous recorded maximum extents,” it said.

Temporal variation is the measure of the change in a lake’s size or boundary and some having exceeded their recorded maximum extents means that few water bodies were found to be larger than ever before on record.

However, Suparco added that persistent cloud cover after the last submitted report in July had limited the availability of cloud-free satellite imagery, making it difficult to accurately assess lake area changes.

On July 2, Suparco had observed 40 unfrozen lakes, indicating accelerated seasonal melting. However, the assessment also indicated at the time that most unfrozen lakes remained within their previously recorded maximum extents.

According to Suparco, a glacial lake becomes a greater concern when its water extent expands beyond its historical maximum. This may indicate increased water storage and a higher likelihood of moraine dam instability or failure, which can increase the risk of a Glof event.

Given the ongoing rise in temperatures and the increasing number of unfrozen lakes, all relevant authorities had been advised to maintain a high level of preparedness, “particularly in downstream valleys of potentially dangerous glacial lakes”, the agency said.

“Regular satellite monitoring will continue throughout the melt season to detect any rapid lake expansion or other signs of increased Glof risk, enabling timely dissemination of alerts and supporting proactive disaster risk management,” it added.

But Dr Karamat Ali, a glaciologist at Karakoram International University, called for more than just satellite monitoring to address the issue. He said that stakeholders were working in silos, with a lack of coordination and trust.

This led to insufficient information about the morphology of glaciers, their microclimates, and mass accumulation in summers and winters, among other parameters, he said.

“Glacial melt is a serious concern,” he told Dawn. “Numerous parameters are ignored which can only verified from field studies, and mere satellite imagery will not suffice.”

For example, he said, there was a lack of adequate information about hanging glaciers, such as the one that caused extensive losses in Nepal earlier this month.

Dr Ali, who has studied glaciers for two decades, called for thorough investigations and field studies to understand the depth, surrounding environments and end moraines (debris accumulated at the end of a glacier) to better understand the hazards and vulnerabilities of Glofs.

He also questioned what investments had been made by the government to address the issue of the rapidly melting glaciers, on which millions of lives depend.

A glacier inventory completed in 2024 revealed that Pakistan was home to more than 13,000 glaciers — one of the largest concentrations outside the polar regions.

Suparco said in its latest assessment that it was regularly monitoring the status of potentially dangerous glacial lakes (PDGLs) using satellite imagery, in order to support early warning and preparedness for Glacial Lake Outburst Flood (Glof) hazards.

The monitoring results were shared with relevant stakeholders, including the Ministry of Climate Change (MoCC) Technical Committee on Glof Monitoring, it added.

A total of 131 PDGLs were identified in the August assessment, with their locations provided by the Provincial Disaster Management Authorities (PDMAs) including the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa PDMA, Gilgit-Baltistan Disaster Management Authority (GBDMA), and Wapda’s Glacier Monitoring and Research Centre (GMRC).

Mohammad Saleem Shaikh, spokesperson for the Ministry of Climate Change and Environmental Coordination, told Dawn after Suparco’s July assessment that the rapid rise in temperatures across the Hindu Kush-Karakoram-Hima­laya region was fundamentally altering Pakistan’s cryosphere and accelerating glacier melt, increasing the risk of Glofs and other climate-induced hazards.

He said that while glacier melt initially boosted water availability, unchecked warming was expanding unstable glacial lakes that could burst without warning, unleashing devastating floods that threatened downstream communities, public infrastructure, agricultural land and essential services.

“The science is unequivocally clear that rising temperatures are reshaping Pakistan’s mountain ecosystems at an unprecedented pace. Every fraction of a degree of warming increases the risk to communities living downstream. Our response must therefore be science-driven, technology-enabled and translated into timely action to protect lives, livelihoods and critical infrastructure,” Shaikh said.

“You need law enforcement and the politicians to get into the discussion about what safeguards and monitoring look like,” Gates said in a taped interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press” programme. “And that has to be a required thing.”

A sudden groundswell has risen in favor of federal intervention after OpenAI said in July that an autonomous AI agent went rogue during a security test and hacked into another company, subverting human control. Gates joined that chorus, saying that government must be involved.

“No one thinks self-regulation is enough,” he said.

In a rare show of unity, the CEOs of rivals Anthropic, OpenAI, Googles DeepMind, Microsoft and xAI have called for slowing the development of increasingly capable AI systems.

But US President Donald Trump and other opponents of additional regulation for AI say new government restrictions would simply give China the upper hand in the AI revolution. Trump has publicly dismissed calls for new laws on AI as a “hoax”.

Gates argued that safeguards would not dramatically hinder the industry, and that the risks of not implementing them are real.

“It’s not a hoax at all,” he told NBC.

Gates has said he wants to meet Trump to discuss AI.

“I hope that, given my life’s work in the field, my saying how unique and different this is and how concerned I am will add to what he’s hearing from other people,” Gates said.

Axios reported that Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei will have dinner on Sunday with Trump at the White House. Anthropic and the White House did not immediately return a request for comment on the Axios report.

Warnings about AI’s risks are not new. But they took on added urgency this month after researchers in leading AI labs attached both a timeline and a probability to those concerns.

Former Anthropic researcher Jacob Coxon warned that AI could kill us all by the end of the decade, prompting US lawmakers to call for new rules to govern the technology. Evan Hubinger, Anthropic’s alignment science lead, echoed Coxon’s warning, saying there was a more than 10 per cent chance of such an event within the next decade.

Some policymakers have proposed mandating a “kill switch” that would allow federal authorities to halt AI models. Gates said that while he was not opposed to some sort of kill switch, it would not be enough if other safeguards were not also implemented.

The US and China agreed to launch a dialogue on AI following President Xi Jinping’s recent visit to Washington.