2023-09-08 10:39:34
Adrian Martinez Fernandezspecialized technician responsible for the Laboratory of Digital Cartography and 3D Analysis of the National Center for Research on Human Evolution (CENIEH), leads an article published in the magazine Land Degradation & Development on the surface evolution and possible disappearance of the Maladeta, one of the largest glaciers in southern Europeand among the three largest on the Spanish side of the Pyrenees, with about 30 hectares.
The results obtained show an average speed of retreat of the glacier front of more than 50 meters per year and average losses of ice thickness of about 7 m (-0.7 m/year) in just 10 years, as well as the disappearance, between 2019 and 2020, of the almost two hectares (20,000 m2) of glacier surface measured in the first campaign in 2010.
“If this pace continues, it is estimated that the Aragonese glacier Maladeta may disappear at the end of the next decade, as has already happened with other glaciers. More than 60% of the Pyrenean glaciers that existed in the mid-19th century have already been lost,” says Martínez.
More than 60% of the Pyrenean glaciers that existed in the mid-19th century have already been lost.
Adrián Martínez Fernández, leader of the study (CENIEH)
Link with the global climate system
The systematic observation of glaciers has been of special interest for decades due to its connection with the global climate system. Understanding the behavior of these environments, sensitive to climate variability, helps to understand and model climate changeo.
However, the quantitative data generation In temperate high mountain environments such as the Pyrenees, it is not as common as in other European mountainous regions.
The information about this glacier in the Aragonese Pyrenees has been obtained from the application of geomatic techniques to document the ice and snow surface of its glacial front. Techniques that have evolved, like the glacier, in the 10 years of monitoring, with different equipment: total stations, GNSS devices, terrestrial laser scanners and drones.
With the help of drones
The research group began the measurements with traditional topographic equipment such as total stations, but in recent campaigns drones have been acquiring greater prominence, allowing much more detailed and extensive information to be recorded on the glacier front, “we have obtained relevant information on the degradation of the cryosphere in the high Pyrenean mountains, with a precision and detail that is uncommon in the study of glaciers for so long,” comments Adrián Martínez Fernández.
We have obtained relevant information on the degradation of the cryosphere in the high Pyrenean mountains, with a precision and detail uncommon in the study of glaciers for so long
Adrian Martinez Fernandez
This study is the result of collaboration between the CENIEH and the Research Group for Recognized Natural Heritage and Applied Geography (GIR PANGEA) of the University of Valladolid, who, with the support of the University of Extremadura, has been leading the monitoring work since 2010. Together with Researchers from the universities of Cantabria, León, the Basque Country and the CSIC Pirenaico Institute of Ecology have participated.
Rights: Creative Commons.
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