https://oko.sh/GreenlandIceStudies
The scale of the melt in Greenland during the heatwave last week is difficult to comprehend but satellite imagery has shown the true extent of the thaw.
Experts have set to work to put the event into context using high-definition pictures from the European satellite network Sentinel.
Greenland's ice sheet, the second largest on the planet after Antarctica, melted at a rate of around 10 gigatonnes per day during the height of last week's heatwave.
The remaining ice has also been tainted with dust and sediment deposits — conditions that favour fast-melting as darker ice absorbs more heat and allows the development of bacteria and other microorganisms.
Pictures from Pierre Markuse, an expert in satellite imagery, show how the ice sheet has evolved between August 2018, which itself was a warm year but not as extreme as 2019, and August this year.
The below image shows a "dark ice" band in West Greenland, where we can see large melt ponds and how the dark area ice has widened.
Darker ice indicates a great level of melting because it is more degraded and absorbs larger amounts of sunlight.
Pictured is a 72km-wide area that measures 36km from north to south — with this in mind, the dark ice has advanced around 10km. You can move the central bar from right to left to compare the two images.