Year-to-year weather variations matter somewhat, but most of the loss is a response to decadal trends in warming. The glacier’s main terminus is the northern terminus (red arrow), though it has southern terminus as well (purple dot), both drain into Behm Canal via different rivers. Here are some of my favorites. Priorities have consistently shifted away from climate change-focused research towards space exploration and investing in technological advances for the future, such as artificial intelligence and quantum information science. In southern watersheds, the loss of cold glacier meltwater during the summer months could lead to low water flows and warmer water temperatures, which would create major challenges for the survival of young and adult salmon. Some of the best glaciers in Alaska Hubbard Glacier. It has been followed by its successor, GRACE Follow-On, in 2018. Glaciers gain mass through snowfall and lose mass through melting and sublimation (when water evaporates directly from solid ice). The glacier and surrounding landscape is protected as part of the 5,815 acres (2,353 ha) Mendenhall Glacier Recreation Area, a federally designated unit of the Tongass National Forest. As we approach 2030, most of these glaciers will be “small insignificant lumps of ice on the landscape,” Fagre said. The loss of ice from Alaska and the Canadian Arctic remains small when compared to the losses seen in the ice sheets of Greenland and Antarctica. This website uses cookies as well as similar tools and technologies to understand visitors' experiences. It is a joint mission by NASA and the German Aerospace Centre, launched in 2002. Retreat of Glaciers in Glacier National Park. Search for information on Montana’s Glacier National Park, and you will likely come across the date 2030. The scenes show just a portion of the park’s full extent, which spans 4,100 square kilometers (1,583 square miles) in northwestern Montana. Alaska Facing Mass Glacier Loss at Record Pace August 7, 2020 Alaska’s glaciers are disappearing at a record pace as 2019 is shaping up to be the state’s hottest year on … In the northern watersheds, however, glacier retreat may create new salmon habitat that could be similar to the southern watersheds prior to the glacier loss. Talk about mind-blowing. Each image was acquired in late summer or early fall to reduce the amount of seasonal snow in the scenes. A glacier stonefly (Zapada glacier) on a snowy backdrop in Glacier National Park. Remote Sensing It has been reported that Trump’s 2021 budget will see an 11 percent cut to science and research carried out at NASA, with many other major science agencies facing similar, if not greater, cuts in funding. In addition to shrinking in area, Grinnell has rapidly thinned. Today the number of ice bodies is 25. Speaking about the implications of the gap in data and looking beyond GRACE-FO, Gardner said that achieving long-term, decade-scale observations is important. Alex Gardner of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory highlighted the importance of the continuity in this data, telling GlacierHub, “continuity is by far the most important thing, beyond the novelty of engineering.”. Icy Bay in Alaska is fed by three large glaciers—Guyot, Yahtse, and Tyndall Glaciers—all of which have experienced a loss in length and thickness and, consequently, a loss in area. GRACE satellites are extraordinary in the way they track each other in perfect orbit, moving in a tug and pull motion as they are deflected by the gravity field. Remote sensing (which acquires information about Earth without making direct contact with it, such as through satellite and drone imagery) has revolutionized the study of glaciers. Image: EUROPEAN SPACE AGENCY / ADAPTED FROM ZEMP ET AL. The GRACE satellites observed the greatest rate of mass loss in Alaska. Johns Hopkins Glacier May 27, 2020 JPEG In southeast Alaska, “glacier change is continuing with no pause or slowdown apparent in the data,” said Chris Larsen. I've now been to Alaska three times, and on each visit have had the chance to get up close and personal with some of its glaciers. We can expect to see another big shrinkage in its footprint very soon, maybe by the end of this summer.”. It is possible for some seasonal snow to persist into August, but most of the blue color in these images is “permanent” snow and ice. Trends for the three benchmark glaciers are consistent with the retreat of glaciers observed throughout the western United States, Alaska, and other parts of the world. “On a glacier only 115 acres in size,” Fagre said, “that’s a huge loss.” The change here is slightly more noticeable because of the stark contrast with Upper Grinnell Lake, which has grown in the past few decades as the glacier has retreated. Sign me up for the Earth Institute newsletter, so I can receive more stories like this. They offer guided hikes and kayaking tours of the surrounding country, including ice hikes on the Exit Glacier.. Glacier National Park: Crown of the Continent. Artist impression of the GRACE satellites in orbit. The southern portion of the image shows the Blackfoot-Jackson Glacier Basin, an area of the park that contains the largest concentration of glaciers. !!! The GRACE mission ended in October 2017, after extending 12 years beyond its intended service. “The reduced mass from thinning makes this glacier particularly vulnerable. Photographs and ground-based surveys have played an important role in tracking the park’s glaciers. The east shoreline of Muir Inlet, Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve, Alaska, pictured during the 1880s or 1890s. Rick Brown owns an adventure tour company called Adventure Sixty North in Seward, Alaska, a small town on an inlet of the Kenai Peninsula. It could eventually send icebergs to downtown Juneau. Glaciers of North America: Glaciers of the Conterminous United States: Glaciers of the Western Unites States. Glaciers that terminate in a lake or the ocean also lose mass through iceberg calving. At Wolverine Glacier on the Kenai Peninsula south of Anchorage, loss was the second highest in a record that goes back to the 1960s. The area covered by glaciers in Alaska is slightly larger than the state of West Virginia. Source: NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Endangered Species Act due to climate-change-induced habitat loss. Even before this image series begins, glaciers in this area had decreased from 21.6 square kilometers (8.3 square miles) in area in 1850 to just 7.4 square kilometers (2.9 square miles) in 1979. In 1850, there were about 150 documented glaciers in this area of the Rocky Mountains. Scientists arrived at the year 2030 through a simple geospatial model running on software from the 1990s. That’s the year by which this park will purportedly be glacier-free. The slight shifting in distance between the satellites as they complete their orbit tells us precise details about mass movements on Earth between each minute. It did not account for more complicated factors such as “snow avalanching” and “snow scouring”—things that can keep a small glacier alive. Using alternative data, a new study has helped to fill the gap, creating a continuous record of rates of glacier retreat around the world since 2002 until present. In a funeral-like gathering, scientists memorialized the glacier, known as Ok, with a plaque that read: "Ok is the first Icelandic glacier to lose its status as a glacier. The University of Alaska Fairbanks LiDAR Altimetry Program has flown repeat surveys of glaciers in Alaska from 1994 to 2014 and has made direct assessments of glacier mass balance on 46% of Alaska's glacier area and 81% of the tidewater glacier area. Alaska’s Muir Glacier, like many Alaskan glaciers, has retreated and thinned dramatically since the 19th century. Modeled Climate-Induced Glacier Change in Glacier National Park, 1850–2100. Satellite missions are collecting a wide range of data about our glaciers and ice sheets with high resolution and over a large scale. Changes in river hydrology and morphology caused by climate-induced glacier loss are projected to be the greatest of any hydrological system, with major implications for riverine and near-shore marine environments. The area shown is the central portion of the park, extending from the Lake McDonald area (west) to the St. Mary area (east). Flight Center. But despite its simplicity, the model painted an accurate, if broad, picture of the situation: the shrinking of the ice in Glacier National Park is real and happening fast. However “it is politically difficult, because as soon as you’ve finished one mission you are already asking for more, and you must find collaborators and more funding sources.” Looking to the future, he said that “Until we have a Copernicus-type program, we will always be risking gaps.” Copernicus is the European continuous Earth observation program, spanning multiple missions of the European Space Agency. Watch an alaskan glacier melt. Alaska and the Canadian Arctic dominated mass loss, whilst the Southern Andes and High Mountain Asia came third and fourth respectively in terms … This series of false-color satellite images chronicles change in the park about every five years between 1984 and 2015. Gardner believes this attitude is slowly changing, however, as others are realizing the value in continuity. Mendenhall Glacier (also Sitaantaagu) is a glacier about 13.6 miles (21.9 km) long located in Mendenhall Valley, about 12 miles (19 km) from downtown Juneau in the southeast area of the U.S. state of Alaska. They addressed the data gap by using MERRA-2 reanalysis data, which assimilates various observational data. Tyndall Glacier became separated from the retreating Guyot Glacier in the 1960s and has retreated 24 km (15 mi) since, averaging more than 500 m (1,600 ft) per year. As global and regional climate continues to warm, the frequency of fire in the park could increase. GRACE-FO acquires data in the same way as GRACE, with a few slight modifications. The world's total ice loss between 1961 and 2016. We show that glacier loss will shift the dominant size fraction of riverine OC from particulate toward dissolved and potentially alter the provenance of particulate OC. 2 Observations of glaciers losing mass are also consistent with warming trends in U.S. and global temperatures during this time period (see the U.S. and Global Temperature indicator). Geological records date back to the early 1940s. We show that glacier loss will shift the dominant size fraction of riverine OC from particulate toward dissolved and potentially alter the provenance of particulate OC. Photo credit: U.S. The agreement between GRACE and MERRA across the data gap is a success story for future scientists who recognize the importance of consistency and uniformity in science. Numerous studies of glacier mass loss have used GRACE data across different time series (such as this 2019 study by Wouters et al. Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) is one satellite mission that has been useful in the study of glaciers. ), making it difficult to compare averages yielded by the various studies. When the Begich-Boggs Visitors Center was originally built, it was right at the foot … The two glaciers once ran together, as this photograph from 1914 shows; by 2009, they had retreated into separate valleys. That model took into account the basic parameters, such as warmer summer temperatures and changes in snowfall. Glacier mass loss in Alaska has implications for global sea level rise, fresh water input into the Gulf of Alaska and terrestrial fresh water resources. Isabella Velicogna told GlacierHub the success of MERRA-2 “shows reanalysis and global climate models have come a long way and are getting more and more reliable.”, Menagerie Glacier in Glacier Bay National Park, Alaska. The early photograph shows … Posted by Mauri Pelto. It is perhaps of concern though that while attitudes internally at NASA may be shifting, those of the Trump administration are not. Muir Glacier in Glacier Bay National Park thinned more than 700 feet in the 23 years between 1980 and 2003. Menagerie Glacier in Glacier Bay National Park, Alaska. These activities demonstrate the value in both GRACE satellite data and MERRA reanalysis data. Glaciers in northwestern USA and southwestern Canada, Alaska, high mountain Asia, and the Patagonian ice fields have lost disproportionately large volumes of ice, relative to their surface area. The GRACE satellites observed the greatest rate of mass loss in Alaska. Although GRACE-FO is producing data that matches the precision and resolution of the original mission, there was an 11 month gap in data between the two missions. The scientists check snow levels against stakes they’ve inserte… There’s nothing quite like historical photos of glaciers to show what a dynamic planet we live on. World of Change. The glaciers of Alaska are melting and retreating: the chief cause is climate change and the loss of ice is unlikely to slow, according to a new study by US scientists. Alaska leads the race with over 3019 gigatons lost in total, or 816 million 747s. A new review of glacier research data published in the Journal of Glaciology predicts Alaska's 25,000 glaciers will lose between 30 per cent and 50 per cent of their mass by the end of this century. In regards to maintaining the data continuity into the future, Gardner told GlacierHub that “As soon as one mission is launched, you have to start preparing for the next.” Discussions at NASA are underway for what is to be GRACE-2. Alaska and the Canadian Arctic dominated mass loss, whilst the Southern Andes and High Mountain Asia came third and fourth respectively in terms of greatest mass lost per year. Gracey Creek Glacier Retreat and Tributary Loss, Alaska . “There is a lot of noise in the system from short-term weather patterns, and we need to reduce this noise” in order to capture trends in climate, he explained. “Remote sensing is the only way to survey glaciers comprehensively with a uniform method in the years to come,” study co-author Isabella Velicogna of University of California Irvine told GlacierHub. We map all glaciers (>4000 km 2) on the Kenai Peninsula, south central Alaska, for the years 1986, 1995, 2005 and 2016, using satellite images. The species is threatened by climate warming induced glacier and snow loss and has been petitioned for protection under the U.S. Taku Glacier, Alaska’s thickest, is one of the last in the area to start receding in a warming climate. “These glaciers will be more or less gone in the next several decades.”. Wildfires in Glacier National Park and Alberta. “These tiny remnants could last 10 to 15 years past that time if they are in sheltered places, but the park will no longer really have viable glaciers.”, Land NASA Goddard Space Portage Glacier. Source: National Park Service, Filling the gap gives scientists an almost two-decade-long record of world glacier mass loss. In the 2015 image, burn scars are visible from the Thompson fire (bottom) and Reynolds Creek fire (top). By comparison, pre-satellite ground measurements are spatially coarse, while physical models often do not capture local change with enough precision. Most were still there when the national park was established in 1910. The glaciers of Alaska are melting and retreating: the chief cause is climate change and the loss of ice is unlikely to slow, according to a new study by U.S. scientists. While Alaska glaciers are losing about -50 Gt/yr, it remains unclear what the role marine dynamics have on the regional mass balance. The team calculated that the world’s glaciers and ice caps lost an average of 281.5 gigatons of ice per year, which equates to 13mm of cumulative sea level rise. Climate consensus - the 97% Climate change Glacier loss is accelerating because of global warming As climate scientists predicted, glaciers are vanishing due … Velicogna told GlacierHub “this was of great concern because scientists were unaware of what they had missed during those 11 months, especially because glaciers can change a lot from one year to the next.” Though long-term trends are clear, it is the details in annual trends and regional trends which scientists were seeking to uncover during the inactivity of GRACE. GRACE satellites detect modifications in the gravitational field that result from changes in mass; they therefore can trace the loss of mass from the world’s glaciers into the oceans with unprecedented accuracy. Source: National Park Service Filling the gap gives scientists an almost two-decade-long record of world glacier mass loss. “People focus too much on the date, but the basic story is still true,” said Daniel Fagre, a research ecologist for the Northern Rocky Mountain Science Center of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS). “On a glacier only 115 acres in size,” Fagre said, “that’s a huge loss.” The change here is slightly more noticeable because of the stark contrast with Upper Grinnell Lake, which has grown in the past few decades as the glacier has retreated. The Trump administration announced significant spending boosts over several years to cut the original 2028 target for a lunar landing by 4 years, to 2024. In Seward, Alaska, Exit Glacier is melting at an astonishing rate. Other phenomena have left their mark on the landscape. Glacier coverage also controls whether OC export is source (C stock) or transport (runoff) limited at the watershed scale. Long-Duration Drought Variability and Impacts on Ecosystem Services: A Case Study from Glacier National Park, Montana. Glacier Bay. A top agenda for the White House is to speed up plans for NASA’s Artemis Program, to land the next people on the Moon by 2024. It maps variations in Earth’s gravity field by taking measurements of the distance between two identical satellites separated in polar orbit, 500km above Earth. This particular pair of images shows the glacier’s continued retreat and thinning in … As the hostile environment surrounding scientific funding may lead to future data gaps in our satellite records, studies like these that find plausible alternative sources of data may become even more useful and important in the future. For now, the clearest reflection of climate change is the ice. Gracey Creek Glacier is a small glacier in southeast Alaska that terminates near the Canadian border. By continuing to use this website, you consent to Columbia University's usage of cookies and similar technologies, in accordance with the, Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE), MPA in Environmental Science & Policy Fall Final Briefings, Student-Only Virtual Roundtable Discussion: Damilola Ogunbiyi, CEO and Special Representative, UN Secretary-General for Sustainable Energy for All, Columbia University Website Cookie Notice, echo do_shortcode('[instagram-feed]'); ?>. Glacier coverage also controls whether OC export is source (C stock) or transport (runoff) limited at the watershed scale. Climate Change Threatens to Strip the Identity of Glacier National Park. In addition to shrinking in area, Grinnell has rapidly thinned. Measurements of Glacier Change. For the case of NASA, he said that it will take time to achieve a “cultural shift” towards data continuity, as NASA historically has been motivated by novelty, innovation and pushing the bounds of engineering. Maps of the glaciers in 1968—surveyed by airplane by the USGS—counted 83 ice-and-snow bodies with areas greater than 0.1 square kilometers. Fire and Burn Scar in Glacier National Park. Warm summer temperatures are causing this glacier to lose about 2 to 3 acres per year, and sometimes as much as 10 acres. In 2006 you can see the burn scar from the Red Eagle fire, which burned 34,000 acres. The increasing rate of glacier mass loss, with eight out of the ten most negative mass balance years recorded after 2010, during a period of retreat indicates alpine glaciers are not approaching equilibrium and retreat will continue to be the dominant terminus response (Pelto, 2019; WGMS, 2020). “All of a sudden, it’s as flat as a pancake compared to its previous bulk,” Fagre said. It is important to monitor changes in mass balance — the net changes in a glacier’s mass, after accounting for gains from snowfall and losses from melting and iceberg calving — in order to generate robust predictions of sea level rise. Glacier National Park: Glaciers/Glacial Features. The north end of the image shows Grinnell Glacier, possibly the most-studied piece of ice in the park. The new study by Velicogna and her colleagues is the first that uses the full time-series of GRACE and GRACE-FO data. Scientists have been concerned about a gap in satellite data that was being used to monitor mass balance changes of the world’s glaciers. McBride Glacier, the only tidewater glacier in the East Arm, is approximately 40 nautical … All of the images were acquired by instruments on Landsat satellites: the Thematic Mapper on Landsat 5, the Enhanced Thematic Mapper Plus on Landsat 7, and the Operational Land Imager on Landsat 8. Alaska’s Columbia Glacier is almost 20 kilometers shorter than it was in 1980. Here we examine Landsat images from … But the change is still apparent; so, too, is the sense of how the shrinking of the glaciers fits into broader ecosystem changes. These are not behemoths like Jakobshavn Glacier in Greenland or Columbia Glacier in Alaska, so change here is not quite as obvious in satellite imagery. Snow and Ice Lemon Creek Glacier in Juneau is one example of rapid ice loss. To see if a glacier is growing or shrinking, glaciologists check the condition of snow and ice at several locations on the glacier at the end of the melt season.