Results published yesterday in the journal Nature reveal that the previous estimates for Antarctica’s thawing during the last ice age 20,000 years ago were off by 2,000-2,200 years. Because Antarctica’s last thaw so closely reflects our own modern meltdown of the continent, scientists hope the new research can help better predict the ice sheet’s future behavior.

“This deglaciation is the last big climate change that we’re able to go back and investigate,” said T.J. Fudge, a doctoral student at the University of Washington and lead corresponding author of the Nature paper. “It teaches us about how our climate system works.” Fudge and 41 other members make up the West Antarctic Ice Sheet Divide project, which is funded mainly through the National Science Foundation.

Most of the previous research for Antarctic climate change came from ice cores drilled in East Antarctica, the highest, driest and coldest part of the continent. This team of researchers instead chose a new spot for a core sample—the West Antarctic Ice Sheet Divide. The area has little horizontal ice flow so the data come from a location that remained consistent over long periods. The ice core is more than two miles (3,405 meters) long and covers 68,000 years, the longest U.S. ice core ever drilled. The team has so far dissected 30,000 years.

Their records showed that while the continent started melting around 20,000 to 22,000 years ago in West Antarctica, the rest of the continent in East Antarctica remained in the deep-freeze stage until about 18,000 years ago, which bolstered the original timeline of the continent’s melting. The scientists believe that warming in the Southern Ocean melted the sea ice around Antarctica, driving thunderstorms inland and further raising West Antarctica’s temperature.

“West Antarctica is influenced by the ocean much more than the ice up high in East Antarctica, so you are able to see this [warming] happening before you notice it in East Antarctica,” Fudge said. “We’re seeing something similar in the modern climate, where West Antarctica seems to be changing more quickly.”

Today’s West Antarctica is one of the fastest-warming places on Earth. In the last 50 years, the middle of West Antarctica has warmed by 4.4 degrees Fahrenheit, three times faster than the general speed of global warming. On the flipside, temperatures in East Antarctica seem to have risen only half a degree or less.

The team will continue their research on the core sample. “This most recent deglacial warming is the spot in time we can look at to really understand how our climate goes through big changes,” Fudge told LiveScience.