Witness a journey to the bottom of an ice sheet

[OKIsItJustMe]

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn16741-witness-a-journey-to-the-bottom-of-an-ice-sheet.html

Witness a journey to the bottom of an ice sheet

17:02 11 March 2009 by Catherine Brahic, Copenhagen
For similar stories, visit the http://www.newscientist.com/topic/climate-change">Climate Change Topic Guide

Video: http://www.newscientist.com/articlevideo/dn16741/15361652001-witness-a-journey-to-the-bottom-of-an-ice-sheet.html">Travel with the camera to the bottom of Greenland's ice sheet

It's like a huge endoscope, probing the bowels of the world's second-largest ice mass. Researchers have brought back unprecedented video from deep inside Greenland's ice sheet.

The footage shows the camera dropping vertically down a natural 100-metre tunnel in the ice, travelling from a 10-metre-wide hole at the surface to the bottom, where ice meets bedrock.

In the early part of the descent, the sides of the tunnel are bright blue. Waterfalls pound their way down across and through the ice, alongside the camera. Then the camera plunges into icy water. This is meltwater from the surface. The water itself carves out such ice tunnels, called moulins.

Under the summer sun, the surface of Greenland's ice sheet melts into pools and lakes. The water is darker than the reflective ice it sits in, so it absorbs more heat from the sun. Eventually, it bores a hole through the ice and sometimes makes it all the way down to the bedrock, where it lubricates the ice sheet, helping it slide towards the ocean.

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[havocmom]

1. bookmarking for my young friends who love science!

Thanks for this one!

[LynzM]

2. Neat!

Gonna watch this later with our daughter :)