Today I hiked up to the glacier tongue with Knut and looked at the ice from close up. I was happy to get some pictures yesterday of the calm lake, which is a bit of a rarity because of the cold glacier near it. The winds from the cold air rushing down the slopes are known as Kadabatic winds (Greek for downhill), these are normal for glaciers because the cold air sinks to the lower elevations because it is denser. When it does this it kicks up a lot of dust which covers the end of the glacier with dirt. This can actually slow down the melting of the glacier by insulating it. Knut is kind to hike with me and teach me about the glacier, he has an amazing education and is a world traveler having been to all continents. His fluency in Norwegian and his technical background makes it clear he is on a college research career path. What I like is that he is very interested in bringing science to high school kids and is encouraging me to explore ways to have kids do field research. As we walk across the rock it is clear there is a waviness to the ground. Knut explains that he can pick this up with his radar and calculate periodicity in the rock. He points out the locations of his seismometers and explains that they are so sensitive that he can actually hear the pinging of the ice calving off the tongue. As we get closer to the glacier you can see an odd rock or two on top of the glacier, these are from rocks slides on the canyon wall, they are a bit unnerving because it is clear they can fall through the ice at any time. The melt water picks up throughout the day, this diurnal variation is common as the sun warms the ice. It is difficult to imagine that last week I was six hundred feet beneath the ice and this whole thing was sliding above me. It is a lot nicer to be on the outside. We reach the tongue and take a few pics, you should never stand under the glacier because it can calve at anytime. I do the stupid thing and stand next to it for the photo op and shiver a bit as a small chunk of ice smacks my backside. Enough to remind me that this is a stupid thing to do....
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