The newest Arctic islands and straits: Origin and distribution, 1997–2021

• Published in: Land Degradation & Development
• Main Authors: Ziaja, Wieslaw, Haska, Wojciech
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Wiley 2023
• Subjects: Arctic; Greenland; Severnaya Zemlya; glacier; Tidewater
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/ldr.4583; https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/ldr.4583; https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full-xml/10.1002/ldr.4583

Abstract The appearance of new Arctic islands and straits as the result of landscape transformation due to tidewater glacier recession under climate warming continues. Analysis of available maps and satellite images has served herein as the main research method. Six new islands, each covering an area of 0.4–248 km 2 , appeared in the years 2018–2021, and are described in this paper. Three other new islands, ranging in area from 0.4 to 3.2 km 2 , appeared along the Greenland coast in 1997, 2001, and 2013, and are described here, and they have not yet been described elsewhere. Seven of the nine aforementioned new islands appeared in Greenland and the European Arctic, where all earlier 35 new islands and straits had appeared due to ice melting. However, two of these appeared in the Severnaya Zemlya area in 2018, becoming the first new islands in the Asiatic (Siberian) Arctic. Additional new islands are now at an advanced stage of formation, and several will appear in the 2020s in the case of a stabilization of the current climate or further warming.