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Records indicate that 14,500years ago, sea level rose by 12-22m in under 340years. However, the source of the sea level rise remains contentious, partly due to the competing climatic impact of different hemispheric contributions. Antarctic meltwater could indirectly strengthen the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC), causing northern warming, whereas Northern Hemisphere ice sheet meltwater has the opposite effect. This story has recently become more intriguing, due to increasing evidence for sea level contributions from both hemispheres. Using a coupled climate model with freshwater forcing, we demonstrate that the climatic influence of southern-sourced meltwater is overridden by northern sources even when the Antarctic flux is double the North American contribution. This is because the Southern Ocean is quickly resalinized by Antarctic Circumpolar water. These results imply that the pattern of surface climate changes caused by ice sheet melting cannot be used to fingerprint the hemispheric source of the meltwater.

Plain Language Summary The fastest major sea level rise ever recorded took place 14,500years ago, when sea level rose by 12-22m in under 340years. The extra water came from melting ice sheets, which stretched across North America and northern Europe as well as Greenland and Antarctica. We ran a climate model to test the impact of different meltwater contributions from Antarctica and the Northern Hemisphere ice sheets (North America, Greenland, and Eurasia). Our simulations demonstrate that northern meltwater has a much stronger and longer lasting effect on ocean circulation and climate than Southern Hemisphere melt. Consequently, northern melting overrides the impact of southern melting even when the flux of water from North America is only half the magnitude of the Antarctic flux. This means that past climate records cannot be used to identify the contribution of meltwater from different ice sheets: the northern signal can override the southern signal.