Dynamics of a Temperate Tidewater Glacier: LeConte Glacier, Alaska

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The LeConte Glacier is a rapidly retreating temperate glacier in southeastern Alaska. It has been stable for 33 years, but rapidly began to calve and retreat in December 1994. It has receded one kilometer over nine-months and is calving into 270-meter deep water. This proposal addresses many of the key issues and recommendations from the recent National Science Foundation (NSF)-sponsored tidewater glacier workshop. Previous studies on similar glaciers have focused on processes at and near the terminus. In this study, the Principal Investigators will measure and characterize a number of parameters along the entire length of the glacier and not just the snout or terminus. The objectives are to: 1) understand what controls the stability of calving glaciers; 2) characterize glacier calving, especially submarine events; and 3) measure and characterize proglacial sedimentation to assess its effects on the dynamics and stability of calving glaciers. Because the LeConte Glacier is rapidly calving, this is a "time-critical" study and it is important to begin collecting data while the glacier is in the initial stages of the calving retreat. Repeated airborne elevation profiling, which has not been preciously used on glaciers, will be used to measure changes in surface geometry along the full length of the glacier on a seasonal and annual basis.