TY - JOUR
T1 - Asynchronous behavior of outlet glaciers feeding Godthåbsfjord (Nuup Kangerlua) and the triggering of Narsap Sermia’s retreat in SW Greenland
AU - J. Motyka, Roman
AU - Cassotto, Ryan
AU - Truffer, Martin
AU - Kjeldsen, Kristian Kjellerup
AU - van As, Dirk
AU - Korsgaard, Niels J.
AU - Fahnestock, Mark
AU - Howat, Ian
AU - Langen, Peter L.
AU - Mortensen, John
AU - Lennert, Kunuk
AU - Rysgaard, Søren
N1 - © The Author(s) 2017. This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
PY - 2017
Y1 - 2017
N2 - We assess ice loss and velocity changes between 1985 and 2014 of three tidewater and fivelandterminating glaciers in Godthåbsfjord (Nuup Kangerlua), Greenland. Glacier thinning accounted for43.8 ± 0.2 km3 of ice loss, equivalent to 0.10 mm eustatic sea-level rise. An additional 3.5 ± 0.3 km3 waslost to the calving retreats of Kangiata Nunaata Sermia (KNS) and Narsap Sermia (NS), two tidewaterglaciers that exhibited asynchronous behavior over the study period. KNS has retreated 22 km fromits Little Ice Age (LIA) maximum (1761 AD), of which 0.8 km since 1985. KNS has stabilized inshallow water, but seasonally advects a 2 km long floating tongue. In contrast, NS began retreatingfrom its LIA moraine in 2004–06 (0.6 km), re-stabilized, then retreated 3.3 km during 2010–14 intoan over-deepened basin. Velocities at KNS ranged 5–6 km a−1, while at NS they increased from 1.5 to5.5 km a−1 between 2004 and 2014. We present comprehensive analyses of glacier thinning, runoff,surface mass balance, ocean conditions, submarine melting, bed topography, ice mélange and concludethat the 2010–14 NS retreat was triggered by a combination of factors but primarily by an increase insubmarine melting.
AB - We assess ice loss and velocity changes between 1985 and 2014 of three tidewater and fivelandterminating glaciers in Godthåbsfjord (Nuup Kangerlua), Greenland. Glacier thinning accounted for43.8 ± 0.2 km3 of ice loss, equivalent to 0.10 mm eustatic sea-level rise. An additional 3.5 ± 0.3 km3 waslost to the calving retreats of Kangiata Nunaata Sermia (KNS) and Narsap Sermia (NS), two tidewaterglaciers that exhibited asynchronous behavior over the study period. KNS has retreated 22 km fromits Little Ice Age (LIA) maximum (1761 AD), of which 0.8 km since 1985. KNS has stabilized inshallow water, but seasonally advects a 2 km long floating tongue. In contrast, NS began retreatingfrom its LIA moraine in 2004–06 (0.6 km), re-stabilized, then retreated 3.3 km during 2010–14 intoan over-deepened basin. Velocities at KNS ranged 5–6 km a−1, while at NS they increased from 1.5 to5.5 km a−1 between 2004 and 2014. We present comprehensive analyses of glacier thinning, runoff,surface mass balance, ocean conditions, submarine melting, bed topography, ice mélange and concludethat the 2010–14 NS retreat was triggered by a combination of factors but primarily by an increase insubmarine melting.
U2 - 10.1017/jog.2016.138
DO - 10.1017/jog.2016.138
M3 - Journal article
SN - 0022-1430
VL - 63
SP - 288
EP - 308
JO - Journal of Glaciology
JF - Journal of Glaciology
ER -