0Having trouble reading this email? Download the PDF. DECEMBER 2010 Home Subscribe Archive Contact Thematic Focus: Climate Change and Ecosystem Management Huge Iceberg Breaks off Greenland’s Petermann Glacier

• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Subjects: Nares; North Pole; Nares strait; Petermann glacier
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.685.4433; http://na.unep.net/api/geas/articles/getArticlePDFWithArticleIDScript.php?article_id%3D61

Why is this issue important? Glaciers are naturally dynamic, slowly changing in shape and size as they move. When a glacier enters the sea, new icebergs form as pieces break off, or calve, from the glacier. How much calving occurs depends on the glacier's growth rate, determined by the amount of new snow and the speed at which it moves and melts. Studies on changes in glacier calving are important pieces of information in helping determine the impacts of climate change. Figure 1: The calving of a giant iceberg illustrated by satellite imagery from 28 July (left) and 5 August 2010 (bottom). The iceberg is expected to drift into the Nares Strait either blocking it or breaking up into smaller pieces (NASA 2010). Figure 2: Large fractures in the glacier tongue as observed on 22 July 2010 (Source: NASA 2010). What are the findings and implications? On 5 August 2010, researchers from the University of Delaware, USA, reported that the Petermann Glacier along Greenland’s northwestern coast had lost about a quarter of its 70-km long floating tongue (Figure 1). Petermann Glacier is only 1 000 km south of the North Pole and is one of Greenland’s two largest remaining glaciers that have shelves or tongues extending into the