fracture propagation to the base of the greenland ice sheet during supraglacial lake drainage surface meltwater that reaches the base of an ice sheet creates a mechanism for the rapid response of ice flow to climate change the process whereby such a pathway is created through thick cold ice has not however been previously observed we describe the rapid 2 hours drainage of a large supraglacial lake down 980 meters through to the bed of the greenland ice sheet initiated by water driven fracture propagation evolving into moulin flow drainage coincided with increased seismicity transient acceleration ice sheet uplift and horizontal displacement subsidence and deceleration occurred over the subsequent 24 hours the short lived dynamic response suggests that an efficient drainage system dispersed the meltwater subglacially the integrated effect of multiple lake drainages could explain the observed net regional summer ice speedup

surface melt driven seasonal behaviour englacial and subglacial from a soft bedded temperate glacier recorded by in situ wireless probes we investigate the spatial and temporal englacial and subglacial processes associated with a temperate glacier resting on a deformable bed using the unique glacsweb wireless in situ probes embedded in the ice and the till combined with other techniques including ground penetrating radar gpr and borehole analysis during the melt season spring summer and autumn high surface melt leads to high water pressures in the englacial and subglacial environment winter is characterised by no surface melting on most days base apart from a series of positive degree days once winter begins a diurnal water pressure cycle is established in the ice and at the ice sediment interface with direct meltwater inputs from the positive degree days and a secondary slower englacial pathway with a five day lag this direct surface melt also drives water pressure changes in the till till deformation occurred throughout the year with the winter rate approximately 60 that of the melt season we were able to show the bed comprised patches of till with different strengths and were able to estimate their size relative percentage and temporal stability we show that the melt season is characterised by a high pressure distributed system and winter by a low pressure channelized system we contrast this with studies from greenland overlying rigid bedrock where the opposite was found we argue our results are typical of soft bedded glaciers with low englacial water content and suggest this type of glacier can rapidly respond to surface driven melt based on theoretical and field results we suggest that the subglacial hydrology comprises a melt season distributed system dominated by wide anastomosing broad flat channels and thin water sheets which may become more channelized in winter and more responsive to changes in meltwater inputs

greenland flow variability from ice sheet wide velocity mapping using radarsat synthetic aperture radar data we have mapped the flow velocity over much of the greenland ice sheet for the winters of 2000 01 and 2005 06 these maps provide a detailed view of the ice sheet flow including that of the hundreds of glaciers draining the interior the focused patterns of flow at the coast suggest a strong influence of bedrock topography differences between our two maps confirm numerous early observations of accelerated outlet glacier flow as well as revealing previously unrecognized changes the overall pattern is one of speed up accompanied by terminus retreat but there are also several instances of surge behavior and a few cases of glacier slowdown comprehensive mappings such as these at regular intervals provide an important new observational capability for understanding ice sheet variability

till beneath ice stream b 4 a coupled ice till flow model a nonsteady model of an ice stream flowing on deforming till shows that the system responds rapidly and in a stable manner to reasonable marginal perturbations for the model we require one dimensional flow and continuity of ice and till and we assume linear viscous till rheology and balance between the driving stress for ice flow and the resistive stress at the bed this allows us to write coupled equations for the time rate of change of the ice thickness and the till thickness in terms of these thicknesses and the till viscosity an analytic steady state solution for ice stream b west antarctica shows that till viscosity decreases slowly downstream probably in response to decreasing effective pressure downstream nonsteady numerical experiments with fixed ice thicknesses at the ends show that a marginal perturbation causes a wave of adjustment to travel the length of the ice stream in about 50 years with a new steady state in about 200 years changes in till thickness tend to moderate perturbations in the ice and thus stabilize the system

persistent flow acceleration within the interior of the greenland ice sheet we present surface velocity measurements from a high elevation site located 140 km from the western margin of the greenland ice sheet and 50 km into its accumulation area annual velocity increased each year from 51 78 0 01 m yr 1 in 2009 to 52 92 0 01 m yr 1 in 2012 a net increase of 2 2 these data also reveal a strong seasonal velocity cycle of up to 8 1 above the winter mean driven by seasonal melt and supraglacial lake drainage sole et al 2013 recently argued that ice motion in the ablation area is mediated by reduced winter flow following the development of efficient subglacial drainage during warmer faster summers our data extend this analysis and reveal a year on year increase in annual velocity above the equilibrium line altitude where despite surface melt increasing it is still sufficiently low to hinder the development of efficient drainage under thick ice

basal dynamics of kronebreen a fast flowing tidewater glacier in svalbard non local spatio temporal response to water input we evaluate the variability in basal friction for kronebreen svalbard a fast flowing tidewater glacier we invert 3 years 2013 15 of surface velocities at high temporal resolution generally 11 days to estimate the changing basal properties of the glacier our results suggest that sliding behaviour of kronebreen within a year is primarily influenced by changes in water input patterns during the meltwater season and basal friction is highly variable from a year to another at present models usually employ parameterisations to encompass the complex physics of glacier sliding by mathematically simulate their net effect for such ice masses with strong seasonal variations of surface melt the spatio temporal patterns of basal friction imply that it is neither possible nor appropriate to use a parameterisation for bed friction that is fixed in space and or time at least in a timescale of a few years basal sliding may not only be governed by local processes such as basal topography or summer melt but also be mediated by factors that vary over a larger distance and over a longer time period such as subglacial hydrology organisation ice thickness changes or calving front geometry

holocene deceleration of the greenland ice sheet recent peripheral thinning of the greenland ice sheet is partly offset by interior thickening and is overprinted on its poorly constrained holocene evolution on the basis of the ice sheet s radiostratigraphy ice flow in its interior is slower now than the average speed over the past nine millennia generally higher holocene accumulation rates relative to modern estimates can only partially explain this millennial scale deceleration the ice sheet s dynamic response to the decreasing proportion of softer ice from the last glacial period and the deglacial collapse of the ice bridge across nares strait also contributed to this pattern thus recent interior thickening of the greenland ice sheet is partly an ongoing dynamic response to the last deglaciation that is large enough to affect interpretation of its mass balance from altimetry

greenland ice sheet motion insensitive to exceptional meltwater forcing changes to the dynamics of the greenland ice sheet can be forced by various mechanisms including surface melt induced ice acceleration and oceanic forcing of marine terminating glaciers we use observations of ice motion to examine the surface melt induced dynamic response of a land terminating outlet glacier in southwest greenland to the exceptional melting observed in 2012 during summer meltwater generated on the greenland ice sheet surface accesses the ice sheet bed lubricating basal motion and resulting in periods of faster ice flow however the net impact of varying meltwater volumes upon seasonal and annual ice flow and thus sea level rise remains unclear we show that two extreme melt events 98 6 of the greenland ice sheet surface experienced melting on july 12 the most significant melt event since 1889 and 79 2 on july 29 and summer ice sheet runoff 3 9 above the 1958 2011 mean resulted in enhanced summer ice motion relative to the average melt year of 2009 however despite record summer melting subsequent reduced winter ice motion resulted in 6 less net annual ice motion in 2012 than in 2009 our findings suggest that surface melt induced acceleration of land terminating regions of the ice sheet will remain insignificant even under extreme melting scenarios

turbulent mixing under drifting pack ice in the weddell sea by providing cold dense water that sinks and mixes to fill the abyssal world ocean high latitude air sea ice interaction is the main conduit through which the deep ocean communicates with the rest of the climate system a key element in modeling and predicting oceanic impact on climate is understanding the processes that control the near surface exchange of heat salt and momentum in 1992 the united states russian ice station weddell 1 traversed the western weddell sea during the onset of winter providing a platform for direct measurement of turbulent heat flux and reynolds stress in the upper ocean data from a storm early in the drift indicated i well formed ekman spirals in both velocity and turbulent stress ii high correlation between mixed layer heat flux and temperature gradients iii that eddy viscosity and eddy thermal diffusivity were similar about 0 02 square meters per second and iv that the significant turbulent length scale 2 to 3 meters through most of the boundary layer was proportional to the wavelength at the peak in the weighted vertical velocity spectrum the measurements were consistent with a simple model in which the bulk eddy viscosity in the neutrally buoyant mixed layer is proportional to kinematic boundary stress divided by the coriolis parameter

extensive winter subglacial water storage beneath the greenland ice sheet w c is a recipient of the nasa earth and space science fellowship d m s is supported by a grant from the nasa cryospheric sciences program h s is supported by grants from the nasa cryospheric sciences and sea level rise programs t t c and r e b are supported by grants from national science foundation nsf and nasa cryospheric sciences s p is supported by the natural environment research council s centre for polar observation

an integrated approach to modelling hydrology and water quality in glacierized catchments the results are summarized of an integrated investigation of glacier geometry ablation patterns water balance meltwater routing hydrochemistry and suspended sediment yield the ultimate objective is to evaluate the assumptions of lumped two component mixing models as descriptors of glacier hydrology and to develop a semi distributed physically based model as an alternative the results of the study demonstrate that a reconstruction of probable subglacial drainage alignments can be achieved through a combination of terrain modelling based on estimated potential surface and dye tracing experiments recession curve analysis evidence of the seasonal instability of the englacial and subglacial electrical conductivities assumed in a mixing model evidence of the non conservative behaviour of water chemistry in the presence of suspended sediment and evidence of the seasonal evolution of the subglacial drainage system based on dye tracing all indicate that an alternative to a lumped static model of the hydrology is necessary the alternative presented in this paper is based on the combination of an energy balance model for surface melt which operates on an hourly time step and accounts for the changing spatial distribution of melt through the day as shading patterns change and routing procedures that transfer surface melt to moulins on the basis of glacier surface gradients then route water through reconstructed conduit systems using a hydraulic sewer flow routing procedure

sedimentary and structural evolution of a pleistocene small scale push moraine in eastern poland new insight into paleoenvironmental conditions at the margin of an advancing ice lobe abstract recent studies of push moraines have focused on the interplay between the dynamics of ice margins and the environmental variables of the foreland into which they advance these studies showed that the spatial distribution geometry and style of the glaciotectonic deformation of push moraines are controlled by ice induced stresses the strain rate the rheology of the deposits and hydraulic conductivity in this work we provide new insight into this interplay at a small spatio temporal scale specifically the ancient glacial system of the liwiec ice lobe within the younger saalian ice sheet in eastern poland the paleoenvironmental variables that are analysed here refer to the dynamics of the hydrological processes that affected the patterns and sediment deposition rate on the terminoglacial fan and the resulting mechanical stratigraphy and hydraulic conductivity of the foreland we document the progradational sequence of the fan deposits that developed as a result of the ice lobe thickening and the steepening of its stationary front the sedimentary features of the fan the lithology of its basement and the hydraulic conductivity of the foreland strongly influenced the geometry and kinematics of fold growth during the advance of the ice lobe the predominance of flexural slip and the development of fractures including fold accommodation faults were interpreted to be an effect of buckle folding due to horizontal shortening induced by ice advance the partial overriding of the push moraine by the ice lobe and thus the submarginal conditions for deformation were inferred from the significant hinge migration and internal deformation of the strata under undrained conditions in one of the folds the synfolding deposition pattern of the fan growth strata allowed us to suggest that the push moraine was probably formed by a sustained advance rather than surge

controls on rapid supraglacial lake drainage in west greenland an exploratory data analysis approach the controls on rapid surface lake drainage on the greenland ice sheet gris remain uncertain making it challenging to incorporate lake drainage into models of gris hydrology and so to determine the ice dynamic impact of meltwater reaching the ice sheet bed here we first use a lake area and volume tracking algorithm to identify rapidly draining lakes within west greenland during summer 2014 second we derive hydrological morphological glaciological and surface mass balance data for various factors that may influence rapid lake drainage third these factors are used within exploratory data analysis to examine existing hypotheses for rapid lake drainage this involves testing for statistical differences between the rapidly and non rapidly draining lake types as well as examining associations between lake size and the potential controlling factors this study shows that the two lake types are statistically indistinguishable for almost all factors investigated except lake area thus we are unable to recommend an empirically supported deterministic alternative to the fracture area threshold parameter for modelling rapid lake drainage within existing surface hydrology models of the gris however if improved remotely sensed datasets e g ice velocity maps climate model outputs were included in future research it may be possible to detect the causes of rapid drainage

influence of increasing surface melt over decadal timescales on land terminating greenland type outlet glaciers over recent decades greenland ice sheet surface melt has shown an increase both in intensity and spatial extent part of this water probably reaches the bed and can enhance glacier speed advecting a larger volume of ice into the ablation area in the context of a warming climate this mechanism could contribute to the future rate of thinning and retreat of land terminating glaciers of greenland these changes in ice flow conditions will in turn influence surface crevassing and thus the ability of water to reach the bed at higher elevations here using a coupled basal hydrology and prognostic ice flow model the evolution of a greenland type glacier subject to increasing surface melt is studied over a few decades for different scenarios of surface melt increase over the next decades the evolution of crevassed areas and the ability of water to reach the bed is inferred our results indicate that the currently observed crevasse distribution is likely to extend further upstream which will allow water to reach the bed at higher elevations this will lead to an increase in ice flux into the ablation area which in turn accelerates the mass loss of land terminating glaciers

deeply incised submarine glacial valleys beneath the greenland ice sheet the bed topography beneath the greenland ice sheet controls the flow of ice and its discharge into the ocean a combination of sparse radar soundings of ice thickness and high resolution ice motion data suggest that many submarine ice covered valleys extend significantly deeper below sea level and farther inland than thought

a modeling study of the effect of runoff variability on the effective pressure beneath russell glacier west greenland basal sliding is a main control on glacier flow primarily driven by water pressure at the glacier base the ongoing increase in surface melting of the greenland ice sheet warrants an examination of its impact on basal water pressure and in turn on basal sliding here we examine the case of russell glacier in west greenland where an extensive set of observations has been collected these observations suggest that the recent increase in melt has had an equivocal impact on the annual velocity with stable flow on the lower part of the drainage basin but accelerated flow above the equilibrium line altitude ela these distinct behaviors have been attributed to different evolutions of the subglacial draining system during and after the melt season here we use a high resolution subglacial hydrological model forced by reconstructed surface runoff for the period 2008 to 2012 to investigate the cause of these distinct behaviors we find that the increase in meltwater production at low elevation yields a more efficient drainage system compatible with the observed stagnation of the mean annual flow below the ela at higher elevation the model indicates that the drainage system is mostly inefficient and is therefore strongly sensitive to an increase in meltwater availability which is consistent with the observed increase in ice velocity

long term support of an active subglacial hydrologic system in southeast greenland by firn aquifers plain language summary the flow of ice and meltwater from the greenland ice sheet into the ocean affects sea levels ice flow is sensitive to meltwater that travels underneath the glacier where and when that water reaches the glacier bed shapes the water channel network under the glacier we use a computer model to analyze how firn aquifers newly discovered meltwater pockets that sit dozens of meters below the ice sheet surface in east greenland change the water channel network under local glaciers we find that the firn aquifer water supply can maintain a water channel network under the glacier that changes less over each season compared to areas without firn aquifer water this subglacial channelization could explain observations of steadier glacier flow in locations with firn aquifers

a high resolution record of greenland mass balance we map recent greenland ice sheet elevation change at high spatial 5 km and temporal monthly resolution using cryosat 2 altimetry after correcting for the impact of changing snowpack properties associated with unprecedented surface melting in 2012 we nd good agreement 3 cm yr bias with airborne measurements with the aid of regional climate and rn modeling we compute high spatial and temporal resolution records of greenland mass evolution which correlate r 0 96 with monthly satellite gravimetry and reveal glacier dynamic imbalance during 2011 2014 greenland mass loss averaged 269 51 gt yr atmospherically driven losses were widespread with surface melt variability driving large uctuations in the annual mass de cit terminus regions of ve dynamically thinning glaciers which constitute less than 1 of greenland s area contributed more than 12 of the net ice loss this high resolution record demonstrates that mass de cits extending over small spatial and temporal scales have made a relatively large contribution to recent ice sheet imbalance

deriving large scale glacier velocities from a complete satellite archive application to the pamir karakoram himalaya mountain glaciers are pertinent indicators of climate change and their dynamics in particular surface velocity change is an essential climate variable in order to retrieve the climatic signature from surface velocity large scale study of temporal trends spanning multiple decades is required satellite image feature tracking has been successfully used to derive mountain glacier surface velocities but most studies rely on manually selected pairs of images which is not adequate for large datasets in this paper we propose a processing strategy to exploit complete satellite archives in a semi automated way in order to derive robust and spatially complete glacier velocities and their uncertainties on a large spatial scale in this approach all available pairs within a defined time span are analysed preprocessed to improve image quality and features are tracked to produce a velocity stack the final velocity is obtained by selecting measures from the stack with the statistically higher level of confidence this approach allows to compute statistical uncertainty level associated with each measured image pixel this strategy is applied to 1536 pairs of landsat 5 and 7 images covering the 3000 km long pamir karakoram himalaya range for the period of 1999 2001 to produce glacier annual velocity fields we obtain a velocity estimate for 76 000 km2 or 92 of the glacierized areas of this region we then discuss the impact of coregistration errors and variability of glacier flow on the final velocity the median 95 confidence interval ranges from 2 0 m year on the average in stable areas and 4 4 m year on the average over glaciers with variability related to data density surface conditions and strain rate these performances highlight the benefits of processing of a complete satellite archive to produce glacier velocity fields and to analyse glacier dynamics at regional scales

greenland ice sheet flow response to runoff variability we use observations of ice sheet surface motion from a global positioning system gps network operating from 2006 2014 around north lake in west greenland to investigate the dynamical response of the greenland ice sheet s ablation area to inter annual variability in surface melting we find no statistically significant relationship between runoff season characteristics and ice flow velocities within a given year or season over the seven year time series annual velocities at north lake decrease at an average rate of 0 9 1 1 m yr 2 consistent with the negative trend in annual velocities observed in neighboring regions over recent decades we find that net runoff integrated over several preceding years has a negative correlation with annual velocities similar to findings from the two other available decadal records of ice velocity in western greenland however we argue that this correlation is not necessarily evidence for a direct hydrologic mechanism acting on the timescale of multiple years but could be a statistical construct finally we stress that neither the decadal slowdown trend nor the negative correlation between velocity and integrated runoff are predicted by current ice sheet models underscoring that these models do not yet capture all the relevant feedbacks between runoff and ice dynamics needed to predict long term trends in ice sheet flow

a reconciled estimate of ice sheet mass balance we combined an ensemble of satellite altimetry interferometry and gravimetry data sets using common geographical regions time intervals and models of surface mass balance and glacial isostatic adjustment to estimate the mass balance of earth s polar ice sheets we find that there is good agreement between different satellite methods especially in greenland and west antarctica and that combining satellite data sets leads to greater certainty between 1992 and 2011 the ice sheets of greenland east antarctica west antarctica and the antarctic peninsula changed in mass by 142 49 14 43 65 26 and 20 14 gigatonnes year 1 respectively since 1992 the polar ice sheets have contributed on average 0 59 0 20 millimeter year 1 to the rate of global sea level rise

shmip the subglacial hydrology model intercomparison project subglacial hydrology plays a key role in many glaciological processes including ice dynamics via the modulation of basal sliding owing to the lack of an overarching theory however a variety of model approximations exist to represent the subglacial drainage system the subglacial hydrology model intercomparison project shmip provides a set of synthetic experiments to compare existing and future models we present the results from 13 participating models with a focus on effective pressure and discharge for many applications e g steady states and annual variations low input scenarios a simple model such as an inefficient system only model a flowline or lumped model or a porous layer model provides results comparable to those of more complex models however when studying short term e g diurnal variations of the water pressure the use of a two dimensional model incorporating physical representations of both efficient and inefficient drainage systems yields results that are significantly different from those of simpler models and should be preferentially applied the results also emphasise the role of water storage in the response of water pressure to transient recharge finally we find that the localisation of moulins has a limited impact except in regions of sparse moulin density

an improved mass budget for the greenland ice sheet extensive ice thickness surveys by nasa s operation icebridge enable over a decade of ice discharge measurements at high precision for the majority of greenland s marine terminating outlet glaciers prompting a reassessment of the temporal and spatial distribution of glacier change annualmeasurements for 178 outlet glaciers reveal that despite widespread acceleration only 15 glaciers accounted for 77 of the 739 29 gt of ice lost due to acceleration since 2000 and four accounted for 50 among the top sources of loss are several glaciers that have received little scientific attention the relative contribution of ice discharge to total loss decreased from 58 before 2005 to 32 between 2009 and 2012 as such 84 of the increase in mass loss after 2009 was due to increased surface runoff these observations support recentmodel projections that surface mass balance rather than ice dynamics will dominate the ice sheet s contribution to 21st century sea level rise

seasonal evolution of the subglacial hydrologic system modified by supraglacial lake drainage in western greenland the impact of summer surface melt on greenland ice sheet dynamics is modulated by the state of the subglacial hydrologic system studies of ice motion indicate that efficiency of the subglacial system increases over the melt season decreasing the sensitivity of ice motion to surface melt inputs however the behavior of the subglacial hydrologic system is complex and some characteristics are still poorly constrained here we investigate the coevolution of subglacial hydrology and ice motion in the p kitsoq region of western greenland during the 2011 melt season we analyze measurements from 11 global positioning system stations from which we derive ice velocity longitudinal strain rates and basal uplift alongside observations of surface ablation and supraglacial lake drainages we observe ice acceleration after the onset of local surface melting followed by gradual ice deceleration consistent with increasing subglacial efficiency in the study area supraglacial lake drainages cooccur with a change in regional strain rate patterns and ice deceleration suggesting that lake drainages contribute to rapid subglacial reorganization at lower ice surface elevations below 900 m above sea level ice motion is correlated with both total basal uplift and its rate of change while at higher elevations 900 1 100 m above sea level ice motion correlated only with the basal uplift rate this pattern suggests that continued cavity growth or subglacial sediment dynamics may be important in the apparent increase in subglacial drainage efficiency at higher elevations in the ablation zone our results further suggest that transient subglacial behavior is important in the seasonal evolution of ice motion

implications of increased greenland surface melt under global warming scenarios ice sheet simulations abstract the greenland ice sheet is likely to make a faster contribution to sea level rise in a warming world than previously believed based on numerical modelling using a parameterization of recent results showing surface meltwater lubrication of ice flow zwally et al science 297 557 2002 218 documented correlation between increased ice velocity and increased surface melt as parameterized by positive degree days they argued that surface water is piped directly to the bed with little delay causing increased basal water pressures and basal sliding velocities an effect not included in recent greenland ice sheet models known to the authors using the pennsylvania state university university of chicago thermomechanical flowline model numerous simulations were conducted to test a wide range of parameter space linking surface melt with a new sliding law based on the zwally et al data under three different global warming scenarios 2 co2 4 co2 and 8 co2 comparisons to reconstructions generated with a traditional sliding parameterization illustrate an enhanced sensitivity of the ice sheet to surface warming resulting in higher ablation rates additional thinning and retreat of the margin and a reduction in ice volume leading to an increased contribution to global sea level rise

long term impact of the proglacial lake jokulsarlon on the flow velocity and stability of breiðamerkurjokull glacier iceland

mass balance and surface movement of the greenland ice sheet at summit central greenland during the grip deep drilling in central greenland the ice sheet topography and surface movement at summit has been mapped with gps measurements of the surface velocity are presented for a strain net consisting of 13 poles at distances of 25 60 km from the grip site some results are the grip site is located approximately 2 km nw of the topographic summit the surface velocity at the gisp 2 site is 1 7 m yr in the w direction the present mass balance at summit is calculated to be 0 03 0 04 m yr i e close to steady state this result is the best now available for summit a small thinning rate might be a transient response of the greenland ice sheet due to the temperature increase at the wisconsin holocene transition

quantifying supraglacial meltwater pathways in the paakitsoq region west greenland increased summer ice velocities on the greenland ice sheet are driven by meltwater input to the subglacial environment however spatial patterns of surface input and partitioning of meltwater between different pathways to the base remain poorly understood to further our understanding of surface drainage we apply a supraglacial hydrology model to the paakitsoq region west greenland for three contrasting melt seasons during an average melt season crevasses drain 47 of surface runoff lake hydrofracture drains 3 during the hydrofracturing events themselves while the subsequent surface to bed connections drain 21 and moulins outside of lake basins drain 15 lake hydrofracture forms the primary drainage pathway at higher elevations above 850 m while crevasses drain a significant proportion of meltwater at lower elevations during the two higher intensity melt seasons model results show an increase 5 and 6 of total surface runoff in the proportion of runoff drained above 1300 m relative to the melt season of average intensity the potential for interannual changes in meltwater partitioning could have implications for how the dynamics of the ice sheet respond to ongoing changes in meltwater production

winter motion mediates dynamic response of the greenland ice sheet to warmer summers 1 we present ice velocities from a land terminating transect extending 115 km into the western greenland ice sheet during three contrasting melt years 2009 2011 to determine whether enhanced melting accelerates dynamic mass loss we find no significant correlation between surface melt and annual ice flow there is however a positive correlation between melt and summer ice displacement but a negative correlation with winter displacement this response is consistent with hydro dynamic coupling enhanced summer ice flow results from longer periods of increasing surface melting and greater duration ice surface to bed connections while reduced winter motion is explicable by drainage of high basal water pressure regions by larger more extensive subglacial channels despite mean interannual surface melt variability of up to 70 mean annual ice velocities changed by 7 5 increased summer melting thereby preconditions the ice bed interface for reduced winter motion resulting in limited dynamic sensitivity to interannual variations in surface melting

surface melt induced acceleration of greenland ice sheet flow ice flow at a location in the equilibrium zone of the west central greenland ice sheet accelerates above the midwinter average rate during periods of summer melting the near coincidence of the ice acceleration with the duration of surface melting followed by deceleration after the melting ceases indicates that glacial sliding is enhanced by rapid migration of surface meltwater to the ice bedrock interface interannual variations in the ice acceleration are correlated with variations in the intensity of the surface melting with larger increases accompanying higher amounts of summer melting the indicated coupling between surface melting and ice sheet flow provides a mechanism for rapid large scale dynamic responses of ice sheets to climate warming

the treatment of meltwater retention in mass balance parameterisations of the greenland ice sheet retention of melt water runoff by percolation and or refreezing in the snowpack cannot be neglected when studying the surface mass balance of the greenlandice sheet in this paper we make a detailed comparison of several treatments proposed in the literature to account for this process in large scale mass balanceparameterizations the melt on the greenland ice sheet is calculated with a revised degree day model using updated datasets of surface elevation and precipitationrate on a 5 km grid crucial model parameters are recalibrated by comparing mass balance characteristics with available observations on a regional basis wediscuss the role of meltwater retention in the light of the overall mass balance of the greenland ice sheet and its sensitivity to climatic change and displaypatterns of effective retention fractions for the various methods as a main conclusion it appears that overall results are quite similar for the various models butthat meltwater retention has a large spatial variation not described by the simple treatments using the most comprehensive retention model the sensitivity of therunoff is found to be 0 35 mm deg c of sea level change per year we also present a new map of the different zones facies that characterize the accumulationarea of the greenland ice sheet that is useful for interpreting field data and calibrating satellite observations

twenty first century glacier slowdown driven by mass loss in high mountain asia glaciers in high mountain asia have experienced heterogeneous rates of loss since the 1970s yet the associated changes in ice flow that lead to mass redistribution and modify the glacier sensitivity to climate are poorly constrained here we present observations of changes in ice flow for all glaciers in high mountain asia over the period 2000 2017 based on one million pairs of optical satellite images trend analysis reveals that in 9 of the 11 surveyed regions glaciers show sustained slowdown concomitant with ice thinning in contrast the stable or thickening glaciers of the karakoram and west kunlun regions experience slightly accelerated glacier flow up to 94 of the variability in velocity change between regions can be explained by changes in gravitational driving stress which in turn is largely controlled by changes in ice thickness we conclude that despite the complexities of individual glacier behaviour decadal and regional changes in ice flow are largely insensitive to changes in conditions at the bed of the glacier and can be well estimated from ice thickness change and slope alone changes in glacier speed in high mountain asia are closely linked to mass balance through gravitational driving stress and largely insensitive to basal conditions according to satellite derived ice flow observations

surface mass balance ice velocity and near surface ice temperature on qaanaaq ice cap northwestern greenland from 2012 to 2016 to better understand the processes controlling recent mass loss of peripheral glaciers and ice caps in northwestern greenland we measured surface mass balance smb ice velocity and near surface ice temperature on qaanaaq ice cap in the summers of 2012 16 the measurements were performed along a survey route spanning the terminus of an outlet glacier to the upper reaches 243 968 m a s l the ice cap wide smb ranged from 1 10 0 29 to 0 13 0 26 m w e a 1 for the years from 2012 13 to 2015 16 mass balance showed substantially large fluctuations over the study period under the influence of summer temperature and snow accumulation ice velocity showed seasonal speedup only in the summer of 2012 suggesting an extraordinary amount of meltwater penetrated to the bed and enhanced basal ice motion ice temperature at a depth of 13 m was 8 0 c at 944 m a s l which was 2 5 c warmer than that at 243 m a s l suggesting that ice temperature in the upper reaches was elevated by refreezing and percolation of meltwater our study provided in situ data from a relatively unstudied region in greenland and demonstrated the importance of continued monitoring of these processes for longer timespans in the future

decadal slowdown of a land terminating sector of the greenland ice sheet despite warming ice flow along land terminating margins of the greenland ice sheet gis varies considerably in response to fluctuating inputs of surface meltwater to the bed of the ice sheet such inputs lubricate the ice bed interface transiently speeding up the flow of ice greater melting results in faster ice motion during summer but slower motion over the subsequent winter owing to the evolution of an efficient drainage system that enables water to drain from regions of the ice sheet bed that have a high basal water pressure however the impact of hydrodynamic coupling on ice motion over decadal timescales remains poorly constrained here we show that annual ice motion across an 8 000 km 2 land terminating region of the west gis margin extending to 1 100 m above sea level was 12 slower in 2007 14 compared with 1985 94 despite a 50 increase in surface meltwater production our findings suggest that over these three decades hydrodynamic coupling in this section of the ablation zone resulted in a net slowdown of ice motion not a speed up as previously postulated increases in meltwater production from projected climate warming may therefore further reduce the motion of land terminating margins of the gis our findings suggest that these sectors of the ice sheet are more resilient to the dynamic impacts of enhanced meltwater production than previously thought

feedbacks between coupled subglacial hydrology and glacier dynamics on most glaciers and ice sheet outlets the majority of motion is due to basal slip a combination of basal sliding and bed deformation the importance of basal water in controlling sliding is well established with increased sliding generally related to high basal water pressure but the details of the interactions between the ice and water systems has not received much study when there is coupling between the systems here we use coupled subglacial hydrology and ice dynamics models within the community ice sheet model to investigate feedbacks between the ice and water systems the dominant feedback we find is negative sliding over bedrock bumps opens additional cavity space which lowers water pressure and in turn sliding we also find two small positive feedbacks basal melt increases through frictional heat during sliding which raises water pressure and strain softening of basal ice during localized speedup causes cavities to close more quickly and maintain higher water pressures our coupled modeling demonstrates that a sustained input of surface water to a distributed drainage system can lead to a speedup event that decays even in the absence of channelization due to increased capacity of the system through opening of cavities which is enhanced through the sliding opening feedback we find that the negative feedback resulting from sliding opening is robust across a wide range of parameter values however our modeling also argues that subglacial channelization is required to terminate speedup events over timescales that are commensurate with observations of late summer slowdown on mountain glaciers

mass balance of the greenland ice sheet at dye 3 the mass balance of the greenland ice sheet a t dye 3 is estimated on the basis of 0 bserva tions of ice thickness accumulation rate surface velocities and surface strain rates the calculations indicate a rate of increase of surface elevation of 3 cm year with 95 confidence limits of 3 cm year and 9 cm year previous estimates of the mass balance of the greenland ice sheet by the same method reported large imbalances these are most probably due to lack of precise data and the use of quantities measured at the surface as representative of depth averaged quantities the most reliable observations indicate that the interior regions of the greenland ice sheet are at present thickening at a rate of a few centimetres per year a contributing cause for this may be the slow thinning of a bottom layer of relatively soft wisconsin ice resume bilan de masse de l lndlandsis groenlandais a dye 3 le bilan de masse est estime it partir des mesures d epaisseur taux d accumulation vitesses et vitesses de deformation superficielles le calcul don ne un epalss lssement de 3 cm an 1 avec un intervalle de confiance au seuil de 95 allant de 3 cm an 1 it 9 cm an i les estimations anterieures du bilan de l lndlandsis obtenues par la meme methode sont examinees on en deduit que les valeurs de bilan tres eloignees de l equilibre sont certainement dues au manque de donnees preclses et ou a i utilisation de donnees superficielles comme valeurs moyennes sur une

greenland ice sheet high elevation balance and peripheral thinning aircraft laser altimeter surveys over northern greenland in 1994 and 1999 have been coupled with previously reported data from southern greenland to analyze the recent mass balance of the greenland ice sheet above 2000 meters elevation the ice sheet is in balance on average but has some regions of local thickening or thinning thinning predominates at lower elevations with rates exceeding 1 meter per year close to the coast interpolation of our results between flight lines indicates a net loss of about 51 cubic kilometers of ice per year from the entire ice sheet sufficient to raise sea level by 0 13 millimeter per year approximately 7 of the observed rise

seasonal variations in greenland ice sheet motion inland extent and behaviour at higher elevations abstract we present global positioning system observations that capture the full inland extent of ice motion variations in 2009 along a transect in the west greenland ice sheet margin in situ measurements of air temperature and surface ablation and satellite monitoring of ice surface albedo and supraglacial lake drainage are used to investigate hydrological controls on ice velocity changes we find a strong positive correlation between rates of annual ablation and changes in annual ice motion along the transect with sites nearest the ice sheet margin experiencing greater annual variations in ice motion 15 18 than those above 1000 m elevation 3 8 patterns in the timing and rate of meltwater delivery to the ice bed interface provide key controls on the magnitude of hydrologically forced velocity variations at each site in the lower ablation zone the overall contribution of variations in ice motion to annual flow rates is limited by evolution in the structure of the subglacial drainage system at sites in the upper ablation zone a shorter period of summer melting and delayed establishment of a hydraulic connection between the ice sheet surface and its bed limit the timeframe for velocity variations to occur our data suggest that land terminating sections of the greenland ice sheet will experience increased dynamic mass loss in a warmer climate as the behaviour that we observe in the lower ablation zone propagates further inland findings from this study provide a conceptual framework to understand the impact of hydrologically forced velocity variations on the future mass balance of land terminating sections of the greenland ice sheet

a synthesis of the basal thermal state of the greenland ice sheet the basal thermal state of an ice sheet frozen or thawed is an important control upon its evolution dynamics and response to external forcings however this state can only be observed directly within sparse boreholes or inferred conclusively from the presence of subglacial lakes here we synthesize spatially extensive inferences of the basal thermal state of the greenland ice sheet to better constrain this state existing inferences include outputs from the eight thermomechanical ice flow models included in the searise effort new remote sensing inferences of the basal thermal state are derived from holocene radiostratigraphy modern surface velocity and modis imagery both thermomechanical modeling and remote inferences generally agree that the northeast greenland ice stream and large portions of the southwestern ice drainage systems are thawed at the bed whereas the bed beneath the central ice divides particularly their west facing slopes is frozen elsewhere there is poor agreement regarding the basal thermal state both models and remote inferences rarely represent the borehole observed basal thermal state accurately near northgrip and dye 3 this synthesis identifies a large portion of the greenland ice sheet about one third by area where additional observations would most improve knowledge of its overall basal thermal state

moulin density controls drainage development beneath the greenland ice sheet this work was funded through a uk natural environment research council doctoral training grant lcag 133 a bowring junior research fellowship st catharine s college cambridge and a leverhulme newton trust early career fellowship all awarded to a f b i j h was supported by a marie curie fp7 career integration grant within the 7th european union framework programme

evolution of the subglacial drainage system beneath the greenland ice sheet revealed by tracers predictions of the greenland ice sheet s response to climate change are limited in part by uncertainty in the coupling between meltwater lubrication of the ice sheet bed and ice flow1 2 3 this uncertainty arises largely from a lack of direct measurements of water flow characteristics at the bed of the ice sheet previous work has been restricted to indirect observations based on seasonal and spatial variations in surface ice velocities4 5 6 7 and on meltwater flux8 here we employ rhodamine and sulphur hexafluoride tracers injected into the drainage system over three melt seasons to observe subglacial drainage properties and evolution beneath the greenland ice sheet up to 57 km from the margin tracer results indicate evolution from a slow inefficient drainage system to a fast efficient channelized drainage system over the course of the melt season further inland evolution to efficient drainage occurs later and more slowly an efficient routing of water was established up to 41 km or more from the margin where the ice is approximately 1 km thick overall our findings support previous interpretations of drainage system characteristics thereby validating the use of surface observations as a means of investigating basal processes

rerouting of subglacial water flow between neighboring glaciers in west greenland investigations of the greenland ice sheet s subglacial hydrological system show that the connectivity of different regions of the system influences how the glacier velocity responds to variations in surface melting here we examine whether subglacial water flow paths can be rerouted beneath three outlet glaciers in the ablation zone of western greenland we use lamont doherty and center for remote sensing of ice sheets of university of kansas cresis ice penetrating radar data to create a new ice thickness map we then use a simple subglacial water flow model to examine whether flow paths can be rerouted and identify the topographic conditions that are sensitive to subglacial rerouting by varying water pressures within an observationally constrained range we show that moderate changes in pressure can cause flow paths to reroute and exchange water from one subglacial catchment to another flow across subglacial overdeepenings is particularly sensitive to rerouting these areas have low hydraulic gradients driving flow so subtle water pressure variations have a strong influence on water flow direction based on correlations between water flow paths and ice velocity changes we infer that water piracy between neighboring catchments can result in a different spatial pattern of hydrologically induced ice velocity speedup depending on the amount and timing of surface melt the potential for subglacial water to reroute across different catchments suggests that multiple hydrographs from neighboring glaciers are likely necessary to accurately ascertain melt budgets from proglacial point measurements the relationship between surface runoff ice dynamics and proglacial discharge can be altered by rerouting of subglacial water flow within and across outlet glaciers

response of glacier flow and structure to proglacial lake development and climate at fjallsjokull south east iceland over recent decades the number of outlet glaciers terminating in lakes in iceland has increased in line with climate warming the mass balance changes of these lake terminating outlet glaciers are sensitive to rising air temperatures due to altered glacier dynamics and increased surface melt this study aims to better understand the relationship between proglacial lake development climate glacier dynamics and glacier structure at fjallsjokull a large lake terminating outlet glacier in south east iceland we used satellite imagery to map glacier terminus position and lake extent between 1973 and 2016 and a combination of aerial and satellite imagery to map the structural architecture of the glacier s terminus in 1982 1994 and 2011 the temporal evolution of ice surface velocities between 1990 and 2018 was calculated using feature tracking statistically significant increases in the rate of terminus retreat and lake expansion were identified in 2001 2009 and 2011 our surface velocity and structural datasets revealed the development of localised flow corridors over time which conveyed relatively faster flow towards the glacier s terminus we attribute the overall changes in dynamics and structural architecture at fjallsjokull to rising air temperatures but argue that the spatial complexities are driven by glacier specific factors such as basal topography

ice front and flow speed variations of marine terminating outlet glaciers along the coast of prudhoe land northwestern greenland satellite images were analyzed to measure the frontal positions and ice speeds of 19 marine terminating outlet glaciers along the coast of prudhoe land northwestern greenland from 1987 to 2014 all the studied glaciers retreated over the study period at a rate of between 12 and 200 m a 1 with a median mean retreat rate of 30 40 m a 1 the glacier retreat began in the year 2000 which coincided with an increase in summer mean air temperature from 1 4 to 5 5 c between 1996 and 2000 in this region ice speed near the front of the studied glaciers ranged between 20 and 1740 m a 1 in 2014 and many of them accelerated in the early 2000s in general the faster retreat was observed at the glaciers that experienced greater acceleration as represented by tracy glacier which experienced a retreat of 200 m a 1 and a velocity increase of 930 m a 1 during the study period a possible interpretation of this observation is that flow acceleration induced dynamic thinning near the termini resulting in enhanced calving and rapid retreat of the studied glaciers we hypothesize that atmospheric warming conditions in the late 1990s triggered glacier retreat in northwestern greenland since 2000

seasonal variability in the dynamics of marine terminating outlet glaciers in greenland recent studies indicate that the dynamics of fast flowing marine terminating outlet glaciers of the greenland ice sheet may be sensitive to climate and ocean forcing on sub annual timescales observations of seasonal behavior of these glaciers at such high temporal resolution however are currently few here we present observations of front position flow speed near surface air temperature and ocean conditions for six large marine terminating glaciers in the uummannaq region of west greenland to investigate controls on short term glacier dynamics as proposed by other studies we find that seasonal front advance and retreat correlates with the formation and disappearance of an ice melange our data suggest that high sea surface temperature anomalously low sea ice concentration and reduced melange formation in early 2003 have triggered multi year retreat of several glaciers in the study area which is consistent with other regions in greenland of the stable glaciers only rink isbrae exhibits a seasonal speed variation that correlates with variations in front position with the others undergoing mid summer deceleration that indicates the effects of subglacial meltwater discharge and drainage system evolution drainage of supraglacial lakes and water filled crevasses results in substantial decreases in speed 40 60 on fast flowing glaciers our results demonstrate that attempts to model ice sheet evolution must take into account short timescale flow dynamics resulting from drainage events and oceanographic conditions

ice velocity changes on penny ice cap baffin island since the 1950s predicting the velocity response of glaciers to increased surface melt is a major topic of ongoing research with significant implications for accurate sea level rise forecasting in this study we u

high resolution 1 km positive degree day modelling of greenland ice sheet surface mass balance 1870 2012 using reanalysis data we show results from a positive degree day pdd model of greenland ice sheet gris surface mass balance smb 1870 2012 forced with reanalysis data the model includes an improved daily temperature parameterization as compared with a previous version and is run at 1 km rather than 5 km resolution the improvements lead overall to higher smb with the same forcing data we also compare our model with results from two regional climate models rcms while there is good qualitative agreement between our pdd model and the rcms it usually results in lower precipitation and lower runoff but approximately equivalent smb mean 1979 2012 smb standard deviation in gt a 1 is 382 78 in the pdd model compared with 379 101 and 425 90 for the rcms comparison with in situ smb observations suggests that the rcms may be more accurate than pdd at local level in some areas although the latter generally compares well dividing the gris into seven drainage basins we show that smb has decreased sharply in all regions since 2000 finally we show correlation between runoff close to two calving glaciers and either calving front retreat or calving flux this being most noticeable from the mid 1990s the author s 2016

direct observations of evolving subglacial drainage beneath the greenland ice sheet simultaneous observations of moulins and boreholes in western greenland show that water delivery to the base of the ice sheet via moulins affects short term ice velocity fluctuations but not late season ice velocity decelerations increased meltwater delivery to the base of the greenland ice sheet will increase the ice sheet velocity accelerating its inevitable rush towards the ocean and subsequent sea level rise or will it debate on this topic is at the forefront of cryospheric research but has been hampered by the lack of simultaneous observations of hydraulic head in moulins vertical shafts that deliver water to the base of the ice sheet and boreholes which monitor basal water pressure lauren andrews and colleagues now provide these observations from a small region in western greenland and reveal that water delivery by moulins into channelized basal flow is indeed linked to short term fluctuations in ice velocity late season decelerations in ice velocity however seem to be controlled by changes in unchannelized flow rather than any shifts in the moulin system seasonal acceleration of the greenland ice sheet is influenced by the dynamic response of the subglacial hydrologic system to variability in meltwater delivery to the bed1 2 via crevasses and moulins vertical conduits connecting supraglacial water to the bed of the ice sheet as the melt season progresses the subglacial hydrologic system drains supraglacial meltwater more efficiently1 2 3 4 decreasing basal water pressure4 and moderating the ice velocity response to surface melting1 2 however limited direct observations of subglacial water pressure4 5 6 7 mean that the spatiotemporal evolution of the subglacial hydrologic system remains poorly understood here we show that ice velocity is well correlated with moulin hydraulic head but is out of phase with that of nearby 0 3 2 kilometres away boreholes indicating that moulins connect to an efficient channelized component of the subglacial hydrologic system which exerts the primary control on diurnal and multi day changes in ice velocity our simultaneous measurements of moulin and borehole hydraulic head and ice velocity in the paakitsoq region of western greenland show that decreasing trends in ice velocity during the latter part of the melt season cannot be explained by changes in the ability of moulin connected channels to convey supraglacial melt instead these observations suggest that decreasing late season ice velocity may be caused by changes in connectivity in unchannelized regions of the subglacial hydrologic system understanding this spatiotemporal variability in subglacial pressures is increasingly important because melt season dynamics affect ice velocity beyond the conclusion of the melt season8 9 10

borehole water level variations and the structure of the subglacial hydrological system of haut glacier d arolla valais switzerland late summer subglacial water pressures have been measured in a dense array of boreholes in the ablation area of haut glacier d arolla switzerland interpolated surfaces of minimum diurnal water pressure and diurnal water pressure variation suggest the presence of a subglacial channel within a more widespread distributed drainage system the channel flows along the centre of a variable pressure axis vpa some tens of metres wide that is characterized by low minimum diurnal water pressures frequently atmospheric and high diurnal water pressure variations these characteristics are transitional over a lateral distance of c 70 m to higher and more stable subglacial water pressures in the adjacent distributed system water pressure variations recorded in boreholes located close to the centre of the vpa reflect the delivery of surface derived meltwater to the glacier bed and result in a diurnally reversing transverse hydraulic gradient that drives water out from the channel into the distributed system during the afternoon and back to the channel overnight subglacial observations suggest that such flow occurs through a vertically confined sediment layer borehole turbidity records indicate that the resulting diurnal water flows are responsible for the mobilization and transport of fine debris in suspension analysis of the propagation velocity and amplitude attenuation of the diurnal pressure waves suggests that the hydraulic conductivity of the sediment layer decreases exponentially with distance from the channel falling from c 10 4 m s 1 at the channel boundary to c 10 7 ms 1 70m away these apparent hydraulic conductivities are consistent with darcian flow through clean sand and typical glacial till respectively we suggest that fine material is systematically flushed from basal sediments located adjacent to large melt season drainage channels beneath warm based glaciers this process may have important implications for patterns of glacier erosion hydrochemistry and dynamics

inland advance of supraglacial lakes in north west greenland under recent climatic warming the inland advance of supraglacial lakes sgls towards the interior regions of the greenland ice sheet gris may have implications for the water volumes reaching the subglacial drainage system and could consequently affect long term ice sheet dynamics here we investigate changes to the areas volumes and elevation distributions of over 8000 manually delineated sgls using 44 landsat images of a 6200 km 2 sector of north west greenland over three decades 1985 2016 our results show that sgls have advanced to higher maximum 418 m and mean 299 m elevations and that there has been a near doubling of total regional sgl areas and volumes over the study period accelerating after 2000 these changes were primarily caused by an increased sgl area and volume at high 1200 m a s l elevations where sgl coverage increased by over 2750 during the study period many of the observed changes particularly the post 2000 accelerations were driven by changes to regional surface temperature anomalies this study demonstrates the past and accelerating response of the gris s hydrological system due to climatic warming indicating an urgent need to understand whether the increasingly inland sgls will be capable of hydrofracture in the future thus determining their potential implications for ice sheet dynamics

large and rapid melt induced velocity changes in the ablation zone of the greenland ice sheet continuous global positioning system observations reveal rapid and large ice velocity fluctuations in the western ablation zone of the greenland ice sheet within days ice velocity reacts to increased meltwater production and increases by a factor of 4 such a response is much stronger and much faster than previously reported over a longer period of 17 years annual ice velocities have decreased slightly which suggests that the englacial hydraulic system adjusts constantly to the variable meltwater input which results in a more or less constant ice flux over the years the positive feedback mechanism between melt rate and ice velocity appears to be a seasonal process that may have only a limited effect on the response of the ice sheet to climate warming over the next decades

evolution of drainage system morphology at a land terminating greenlandic outlet glacier 1 the influence of meltwater on the dynamics and geomorphic impact of the greenland ice sheet is strongly controlled by the morphology of the ice sheet s drainage system however this system and its evolution through the melt season remain poorly understood here we present the results of an intensive programme of dye tracing experiments undertaken along the lower 14 km of a land terminating greenlandic outlet glacier over a period of four months during the 2010 melt season these data are interpreted in conjunction with observations of proglacial discharge englacial water storage surface melt rates and ice velocity to produce a detailed picture of the changing hydrology of the glacier following the onset of melt in the spring inputs to the drainage system regularly exceed outputs causing the englacial water level to rise to the ice sheet surface during this time there is a rapid transition from distributed to channelized drainage in those parts of the drainage system closed by ice deformation over winter as the melt season progresses channel efficiency increases and englacial storage and ice velocity decrease high velocity events continue to be observed following the channelization of the drainage system however indicating that hydrological forcing of ice velocity occurs despite the existence of channels during periods when meltwater inputs exceed the capacity of the subglacial drainage system

observations of buried lake drainage on the antarctic ice sheet between 1992 and 2017 the antarctic ice sheet ais lost ice equivalent to 7 6 3 9 mm of sea level rise ais mass loss is mitigated by ice shelves that provide a buttress by regulating ice flow from tributary glaciers however ice shelf stability is threatened by meltwater ponding which may initiate or reactivate preexisting fractures currently poorly understood processes here through ground penetrating radar gpr analysis over a buried lake in the grounding zone of an east antarctic ice shelf we present the first field observations of a lake drainage event in antarctica via vertical fractures concurrent with the lake drainage event we observe a decrease in surface elevation and an increase in sentinel 1 backscatter finally we suggest that fractures that are initiated or reactivated by lake drainage events in a grounding zone will propagate with ice flow onto the ice shelf itself where they may have implications for its stability

an automated method for mapping geomorphological expressions of former subglacial meltwater pathways hummock corridors from high resolution digital elevation data abstract elongated tracts of hummocks or hummock corridors exposed on palaeo ice sheet beds are believed to represent former subglacial meltwater pathways here we present a method coded in matlab for automatically detecting and mapping hummock corridors from high resolution digital elevation models dems initially the dem is filtered to remove bed roughness outside the size range of hummocks a fast fourier transform is then performed to determine the dominant orientation of hummock corridors and remove misaligned features finally image segmentation is used to isolate and extract the hummock corridors as a binary mask the automated approach is tested visually and statistically against detailed manual mapping in three areas of canada and northern scandinavia results show that while the automated method does not perfectly reproduce the manual mapping it successfully captures the general configuration morphometry length and width and location of hummock corridors despite variation in expression across and between sites this technique is ideally suited to take advantage of newly available high resolution digital elevation data e g the arcticdem whose enormous volume makes large scale manual mapping prohibitively time consuming its application will enable efficient and comprehensive mapping of the spatial distribution of hummock corridors across palaeo beds that is necessary for deriving insights into their formation and the organisation of subglacial meltwater flow beneath ice sheets

carbon dating reveals a seasonal progression in the source of particulate organic carbon exported from the greenland ice sheet surface melt from the greenland ice sheet gris collects particulate organic carbon poc as it drains into subglacial environments and transports it downstream where it serves as a microbial substrate we hypothesized that older poc is entrained by meltwaters as the subglacial drainage network expands upglacier over the summer to test this poc samples were collected from a meltwater river exiting the gris over an ablation season and 14c dated resulting values were compared with meltwater hydrochemistry and satellite observations of the catchment area we found that poc ages increased from 5000 to 9000 years b p until peak discharge and catchment size afterward significant fluctuations in poc age were observed interpreted to result from periods of high and low subglacial hydrological pressure and sediment supply and subsequent exhaustion these observations suggest a seasonal progression in the source of poc exported from the gris and provide evidence for a seasonally evolving subglacial drainage system

plastic bed beneath hofsjokull ice cap central iceland and the sensitivity of ice flow to surface meltwater flux author s minchew b simons m bjornsson h palsson f morlighem m seroussi h larour e hensley s abstract the author s 2016 the mechanical properties of glacier beds play a fundamental role in regulating the sensitivity of glaciers to environmental forcing across a wide range of timescales glaciers are commonly underlain by deformable till whose mechanical properties and influence on ice flow are not well understood but are critical for reliable projections of future glacier states using synoptic scale observations of glacier motion in different seasons to constrain numerical ice flow models we study the mechanics of the bed beneath hofsjokull a land terminating ice cap in central iceland our results indicate that the bed deforms plastically and weakens following incipient summertime surface melt combining the inferred basal shear traction fields with a coulomb plastic bed model we estimate the spatially distributed effective basal water pressure and show that changes in basal water pressure and glacier accelerations are non local and non linear these results motivate an idealized physical model relating mean basal water pressure and basal slip rate wherein the sensitivity of glacier flow to changes in basal water pressure is inversely related to the ice surface slope