Glacier flows at an accelerated speed

By eco-logic-view on July 13, 2012 • ( 0 )

Have you heard of Sermeq Avangnardleq glacier?

Well, National Science Foundation, in its article reports that this glacier, located about 35 kilometers northeast of the coastal town Ilulissat in west Greenland, has been flowing at an accelerated speed towards the ocean since 2000.

In the last century and up to 1999, the glacier surface was smooth and used by the people of Ilulissat with their dog sledges to access the ice sheet. But in the last decade, surface air temperatures started to increase in summer and now, the glacier moves with a speed of several miles per hour into the ocean, leaving its surface heavily crevassed and only accessible by helicopter.

Climate and glacier studies have been carried out in this region since 1990 and have documented the rapid increase in ice flow during the warming climate.

This picture was taken as part of the Greenland Climate Network (GC-Net), supported in part by a grant from the National Science Foundation