Studying Ice Rivers to Predict Future Sea Level Rise
22.07.2009 - Water & Oceans, Ice & Snow, Other, Antarctic
A study published this week in Nature Geoscience sheds new light on the quest to understand how Antarctica's vast glaciers may eventually contribute to future sea-level rise.
Scientists from the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) and Durham University created a new 3-D map created using radar measurements,revealing features in the landscape beneath the the Rutford Ice Stream,a vast river of ice ten times wider than the Rhine in the WestAntarctic Ice Sheet, which flows at a rate of one metre per day.
Two researchers spent months living and working on the Rutford IceStream in 2007, towing radar equipment back and forth across the ice tomeasure its thickness and construct a picture of the landscapebeneath. The radar images revealed a lubricating mixture of sedimentand water below the ice, which facilitates its flow towards the ocean.This layer is also sculpted into a series of massive ridges the size oflarge buildings separated by deep furrows, which control the icestream's flow rate.
British Antarctic Survey glaciologist Edward King, lead author of thestudy, said the study would lead to "the better understanding of howice streams behave and how they might change in the future." Co-authorDr. Chris Stokes from Durham University, who has investigatedsimilar features in parts of northern Canada covered by glaciers 9000years ago, said the next step will be to look at similar features inCanada to understand what happened as the North American glaciersdisappeared following the last glacial maximum.
