DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.16577959
title: Dataset for: A comparison of supraglacial meltwater features throughout contrasting melt seasons: Southwest Greenland

description: Supraglacial Meltwater Features Dataset – Southwest Greenland (2018 & 2019)

This dataset accompanies the publication:Glen, E., Leeson, A., Banwell, A. F., Maddalena, J., Corr, D., Atkins, O., Noël, B., and McMillan, M.A comparison of supraglacial meltwater features throughout contrasting melt seasons: Southwest Greenland.The Cryosphere, 19, 1047–1066, 2025. https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-19-1047-2025© Author(s) 2025. Licensed under CC BY 4.0.

1. About This Dataset

This dataset provides spatial polygon shapefiles of supraglacial meltwater features across the Russell–Leverett Glacier catchment in southwest Greenland, captured during two contrasting melt seasons:





2018 – a relatively low melt year




2019 – a high melt year



The mapped features include:





Supraglacial lakes (large and small)




Slush fields




Supraglacial channels (rivers)



This dataset enables spatiotemporal analysis of surface hydrology in a warming climate and highlights the often-overlooked role of small lakes and slush in supraglacial meltwater dynamics.

2. Folder Structure

Each year contains subdirectories grouping shapefiles by feature type and satellite image date:

Meltwater_Features_V3/
  2018/
    Large_Lakes/       # Supraglacial lakes > 0.0495 km²
    Small_Lakes/       # Supraglacial lakes 0.0018–0.0495 km²
    Slush/             # Slush fields
    Rivers/            # Supraglacial channels

  2019/
    Large_Lakes/
    Small_Lakes/
    Slush/
    Rivers/


3. Shapefile Naming Convention

Each shapefile follows the naming pattern:

[SENSOR]_[YYYYMMDD]_[TYPE].shp

For example:S2_20190824_Small_Lakes.shp refers to small lakes mapped from Sentinel-2 imagery acquired on 24 August 2019.





SENSOR → S2 (Sentinel-2) or L8 (Landsat 8)




YYYYMMDD → date of image acquisition




TYPE → Large_Lakes, Small_Lakes, Slush, or Rivers



4. Satellite Data Overview








Sensor
Resolution
Notes




Sentinel-2
10 m
Primary source (MSI sensor)


Landsat 8
15–30 m
Supplemented coverage (OLI sensor, pan-sharpened)




Temporal coverage:





2018: 1 May – 30 September (~5-day revisit)




2019: 1 May – 30 September (~2-day revisit)



5. Attribute Information

Each shapefile contains a minimal set of retained attributes specific to the meltwater feature type.








Feature Type
Attribute
Units
Description




Large Lakes
Area
km²
Polygon area


 
Volume
m³
Estimated water volume


Small Lakes
Area
km²
Polygon area


 
Volume
m³
Estimated water volume


Slush Fields
Area
km²
Polygon area


Supraglacial Channels
Area
km²
Polygon area of vectorised mask






6. Feature Classification Summary








Feature Type
Methodology




Large Lakes
NDWI/NDWI_ice thresholding with size filtering (> 0.0495 km²)


Small Lakes
NDWI/NDWI_ice thresholding with size filtering (0.0018–0.0495 km²)


Channels
Gabor filtering + connectivity metrics (after Yang et al., 2015)


Slush Fields
Adapted NDWI thresholds (Bell et al., 2017) with iterative tuning




7. Recommended Tools

This dataset can be used with:





GIS software: QGIS, ArcGIS Pro (recommended for visual inspection)




Python: geopandas, shapely, matplotlib




MATLAB: Compatible with FASTER lake tracking tools



8. Contact

Emily Glene.glen@lancaster.ac.ukLancaster Environment CentreLancaster University, UK

9. Citation

If using this dataset, please cite both the paper and the data archive:

PaperGlen, E., Leeson, A., Banwell, A. F., Maddalena, J., Corr, D., Atkins, O., Noël, B., and McMillan, M.:A comparison of supraglacial meltwater features throughout contrasting melt seasons: Southwest Greenland,The Cryosphere, 19, 1047–1066, https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-19-1047-2025, 2025.

DatasetGlen, E. (2024): Supraglacial Meltwater Features in Southwest Greenland (2018–2019), Zenodo, https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.11645884