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Disappearing Frontier: Alaska's Glaciers Retreating at Record Pace

Reuters

   ANCHORAGE - Alaska will soon close a year that is shaping up as its
   hottest on record, with glaciers in the "Frontier State" melting at
   record or near-record levels, pouring waters into rising global seas,
   scientists said after taking fall measurements.

   Lemon Creek Glacier in Juneau, where records go back to the 1940s, had
   its second consecutive year of record mass loss, with 3 meters erased
   from the surface, U.S. Geological Survey glaciologist Louis Sass told
   Reuters.

   Melt went all the way up to the summit, said Sass, one of the experts
   who travel to benchmark glaciers to take measurements in the fall.

   "That's a really bad sign for a glacier," he said, noting that
   high-altitude melt means there is no accumulation of snow to compact
   into ice and help offset lower-elevation losses.

   At Wolverine Glacier on the Kenai Peninsula south of Anchorage, loss
   was the second highest in a record that goes back to the 1960s. Sass
   said it failed to match the record set in 2004 only because so much of
   the glacier had already melted.

   "The lower part's completely gone now," he said.

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