The Turner Glacier in south Alaska used to move at stable speeds until 2020. Now, the glacier charges forward 65 feet a day, bulldozing sand and debris into the ocean.
University of Idaho researchers set out for Alaska to understand glaciers and how they move through their environments.
The big question they’re looking to answer is how glaciers react to water input and understand glacier surging.
Funded by the National Science Foundation, researchers at the UI collaborated with faculty at Boise State University to begin the UI Glacier Dynamics Lab project. Timothy Bartholomaus, glaciologist and assistant professor at UI and Chris Miele, a Ph.D. student in the Department of Geological Sciences, teamed up with the University of British Colombia and Ellyn Enderlin and Dyland Mikesell at BSU.
The glacier they studied happened to be in the perfect location because it was relatively accessible from Idaho. Bartholomaus said Alaskan glaciers are changing very quickly and create great opportunities for science. It was also easier to travel there than to glaciers in Greenland.
Staying in the small village of Yakutat, traditionally a Native Alaskan settlement right on the Pacific Ocean, they were flown in via helicopter to the glacier’s exact location.
There were challenges while doing fieldwork during COVID-19, Miele said. During their stay, they socially distanced and always wore masks.
“We were doing as much as possible to be isolated from each other while actually staying in the same Lodge,” Miele said.
The team visited the glacier for five to six days during their stay in Alaska. Before traveling, they viewed the glacier over satellite imagery and found it was going through a surge. When they arrived, they saw how pervasive and fractured it actually was.
During their study, they focused on figuring out how glaciers move and how water moves through glaciers. Because the glacier was moving at fast rates, they were able to dive further into their research question than originally anticipated.
When a glacier surges, it accelerates at a rate 10 to 100 times faster than its usual pace, according to the National Snow and Ice Data Center. Typically, glaciers move around three feet a day, but the Turner Glacier was moving around 65 feet a day. The behavior happens around seven years and is rare; at least 1% of glaciers surge.
Along with abnormal behavior in this glacier, many glaciers around the world are retreating.
“People have long suspected glaciers getting smaller since the 1990s, and I think scientists are seeing air temperature rising globally,” Bartholomaus said. “When you put carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, the planet gets warmer. About 60% to 70% of glacial retreat can be explained by this temperature change.”
They had an array of tools they used, including advanced GPS receivers and hand drills found in someone’s garage. They used a measuring app on a cell phone to measure the glacier’s push between markers along with an earthquake monitoring equipment seismometer that people use to track earthquakes. Sensitive GPS receivers drilled into the glacier to measure speeds. A radar antenna to see how much water is in the glacier using radio waves and cameras, taking photos every hour to time-lapse its movement.
Miele said the most useful tool they had was the helicopter and a skilled pilot, bringing them to the glacier’s location that would be impossible to access otherwise. Without proper equipment, research can become challenging out in the field, and although they were equipped, there were still had situations when they had to think on the fly.
“We had to power all of the devices we set up on the glacier and decided to use aerosol batteries powered by oxygen,” Miele said. “If these batteries get buried under 10 meters of snow, the entire system you set up is going to die from loss of power. The weird little creative things we did was by taking pieces of hose and constructing snorkels that would go out of the battery box several meters in the air, the batteries would get a flow of air.”
Eventually, the team will have to go up to the glacier and collect data and their equipment. The information they’ve collected will allow other glaciologists a better understanding of the connection between water flow through glaciers, ice sheets and glacier movement.
Traveling back to the glacier will give new opportunities to Ph. D. students to gain experience in fieldwork. Their next study in spring 2021 will observe the Wolverine Glacier. Bartholomaus is looking to hire another student researcher to carry out the Turner Glacier project in the fall and push data analysis forward. More information can be found on the project’s website.
Emily Pearce can be reached at [email protected] or on Twitter @Emily_A_Pearce