These images may look otherworldly, but they don’t show icy exoplanets. These gorgeous photos of Earth’s polar ice come from NASA's Operation #IceBridge—and while the mission officially ended last week, you can still explore more high-def images @NSIDC: nsidc.org/the-drift/data…
Summer melting exposes ice layers thousands of years old along the edge of Humboldt Glacier in northwest Greenland. Glaciers consist of snow that has been transformed into thick ice layers and flowed downhill, where it’s often exposed at the edge.
An iceberg surrounded by sea ice floes off the coast of Wilkes Land, East Antarctica. Operation #IceBridge data helps scientists study the height, thickness and topography of sea ice in the polar seas. Icebergs calve off land ice, and sea ice forms by freezing ocean water.
The turquoise waters of a glacial river sculpt the surface of 79N Glacier in northeastern Greenland. Rivers and lakes formed by summer melting transport massive amounts of water on, within, and under the ice sheet.
The shores of a refreezing lake on the surface of Zachariæ Isstrøm in northeast Greenland. A reflection from NASA’s Airborne Topographic Mapper laser altimeter is seen as a pale green dot on the top left corner of the image.
Ridged sea ice floes in Fram Strait between Greenland and Svalbard. Operation #IceBridge officially came to an end recently, but its legacy will live through the hundreds of terabytes of data collected since 2009.
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Hi everyone, I’m Dr. Boisvert! Today I want to talk to you about the parts of the #ocean that freeze over, like this sea ice just outside of Thule, Greenland in the Arctic taken during an Operation #IceBridge campaign in 2016. 🧊🧊🧊🧊#WorldOceansDay
The seas in the mid-Atlantic and the Arctic are very different, but they’re part of the same global ocean! Here’s me ‘floating’ on sea ice off the coast of Greenland in 2016 and me again floating on Ocean City Beach in Maryland last weekend. 🧊🧊🧊🌊🌊🌊#WorldOceansDay
In the Arctic the ocean is cold enough (-1.8ºC🥶) to freeze saltwater and create sea ice. But here in the mid-Atlantic, the ocean is much warmer thanks to a massive current known as the Gulf Stream, which transports heat from the tropics.🌴🌎🌴 #WorldOceansDay
With data from a rare expedition to Greenland, researchers are shedding more light into the complex subglacial processes that control how fast glaciers slide toward the ocean and contribute to sea level rise. go.nasa.gov/2PY0oCG
Researchers camped on the surface of Russell Glacier to study how its sliding velocity changed in response to meltwater that drains down to the bottom of the ice
At the edge of the ice sheet, where glaciers melt constantly, meltwater rushes everywhere through an intricate system of lakes and streams. Some of those streams thunder off into sinkhole-like structures called moulins, which funnel water downwards.