Holy (Ice) Sheet!
John Maurer (CIRES/NSIDC)

Digital photograph
An aerial view of Jakobshavn Isbrae (pronounced “yah-cub-SAH-ven EES-bray,” Danish for Jakobshavn Glacier), Greenland's largest outlet glacier and the fastest moving glacier in the world, which drains into the ocean at a rate of about 13 kilometers (8 mi) per year, or 35 meters (115 ft) per day, or 1.5 meters (4.5 ft) per hour, contributing to increasing concerns about global sea level rise. At 69 degrees north latitude along the central west coast of Greenland, large icebergs calve from its terminus into Disko Bay to eventually float into Baffin Bay and slowly melt as they travel south into the Labrador Sea. The iceberg that sunk the Titanic was likely from Jakobshavn. Bright blue melt ponds/lakes can be seen in this summer photo amidst crevasses as deep as a house. In order to better understand Greenland’s climate, a series of 20 automatic weather stations (AWS) have been installed here and elsewhere on the ice sheet since 1995 in order to collect data across Greenland. The Greenland Climate Network (GC-Net) provides critical climate information over vast unpopulated regions of the Greenland ice sheet.

Traveling