Rock glaciers throughout the French Alps accelerated and destabilised since 1990 as air temperatures increased
Abstract Rock glaciers—ice-rich creeping landforms typical of permafrost mountain ranges—can develop an anomalous landslide-like behaviour called destabilisation. This behaviour is characterised by failure mechanisms (including cracks and crevasses) and increases in displacement rates by one to two...
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2021
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crspringernat:10.1038/s43247-021-00150-6 2023-05-15T16:37:42+02:00 Rock glaciers throughout the French Alps accelerated and destabilised since 1990 as air temperatures increased Marcer, Marco Cicoira, Alessandro Cusicanqui, Diego Bodin, Xavier Echelard, Thomas Obregon, Renée Schoeneich, Philippe EC | European Regional Development Fund 2021 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s43247-021-00150-6 http://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-021-00150-6.pdf http://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-021-00150-6 en eng Springer Science and Business Media LLC https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0 CC-BY Communications Earth & Environment volume 2, issue 1 ISSN 2662-4435 General Earth and Planetary Sciences General Environmental Science journal-article 2021 crspringernat https://doi.org/10.1038/s43247-021-00150-6 2022-01-04T07:05:12Z Abstract Rock glaciers—ice-rich creeping landforms typical of permafrost mountain ranges—can develop an anomalous landslide-like behaviour called destabilisation. This behaviour is characterised by failure mechanisms (including cracks and crevasses) and increases in displacement rates by one to two orders of magnitude. Existing studies of this phenomenon have been limited to a small number of landforms and short time spans. Here, we systematically investigate the evolution of rock glacier kinematics over the past seven decades for the entire French Alps by combining observations of landform features indicative of the onset of destabilisation with data on displacements rates using aerial orthoimagery. We show that rock glacier velocities have significantly increased since the 1990s, concurrent with the development of destabilisation in 18 landforms that represent 5% of the 337 active rock glaciers. This pattern of activity correlates with rising air temperatures in the region, which suggests that a warming climate may play a role in this process. Article in Journal/Newspaper Ice permafrost Springer Nature (via Crossref) Communications Earth & Environment 2 1 |
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Open Polar |
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Springer Nature (via Crossref) |
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crspringernat |
language |
English |
topic |
General Earth and Planetary Sciences General Environmental Science |
spellingShingle |
General Earth and Planetary Sciences General Environmental Science Marcer, Marco Cicoira, Alessandro Cusicanqui, Diego Bodin, Xavier Echelard, Thomas Obregon, Renée Schoeneich, Philippe Rock glaciers throughout the French Alps accelerated and destabilised since 1990 as air temperatures increased |
topic_facet |
General Earth and Planetary Sciences General Environmental Science |
description |
Abstract Rock glaciers—ice-rich creeping landforms typical of permafrost mountain ranges—can develop an anomalous landslide-like behaviour called destabilisation. This behaviour is characterised by failure mechanisms (including cracks and crevasses) and increases in displacement rates by one to two orders of magnitude. Existing studies of this phenomenon have been limited to a small number of landforms and short time spans. Here, we systematically investigate the evolution of rock glacier kinematics over the past seven decades for the entire French Alps by combining observations of landform features indicative of the onset of destabilisation with data on displacements rates using aerial orthoimagery. We show that rock glacier velocities have significantly increased since the 1990s, concurrent with the development of destabilisation in 18 landforms that represent 5% of the 337 active rock glaciers. This pattern of activity correlates with rising air temperatures in the region, which suggests that a warming climate may play a role in this process. |
author2 |
EC | European Regional Development Fund |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Marcer, Marco Cicoira, Alessandro Cusicanqui, Diego Bodin, Xavier Echelard, Thomas Obregon, Renée Schoeneich, Philippe |
author_facet |
Marcer, Marco Cicoira, Alessandro Cusicanqui, Diego Bodin, Xavier Echelard, Thomas Obregon, Renée Schoeneich, Philippe |
author_sort |
Marcer, Marco |
title |
Rock glaciers throughout the French Alps accelerated and destabilised since 1990 as air temperatures increased |
title_short |
Rock glaciers throughout the French Alps accelerated and destabilised since 1990 as air temperatures increased |
title_full |
Rock glaciers throughout the French Alps accelerated and destabilised since 1990 as air temperatures increased |
title_fullStr |
Rock glaciers throughout the French Alps accelerated and destabilised since 1990 as air temperatures increased |
title_full_unstemmed |
Rock glaciers throughout the French Alps accelerated and destabilised since 1990 as air temperatures increased |
title_sort |
rock glaciers throughout the french alps accelerated and destabilised since 1990 as air temperatures increased |
publisher |
Springer Science and Business Media LLC |
publishDate |
2021 |
url |
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s43247-021-00150-6 http://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-021-00150-6.pdf http://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-021-00150-6 |
genre |
Ice permafrost |
genre_facet |
Ice permafrost |
op_source |
Communications Earth & Environment volume 2, issue 1 ISSN 2662-4435 |
op_rights |
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0 |
op_rightsnorm |
CC-BY |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1038/s43247-021-00150-6 |
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Communications Earth & Environment |
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2 |
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1 |
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1766028009967452160 |