What Happens When A Glacier is Lost?
What Happens When A Glacier is Lost?
The North Cascade Glacier Climate Project (NCGCP) began in 1984 to identify the response of Washington’s North Cascade glaciers and the streams they feed to regional climate change. This was in response to a 1983 request from the National Academy of Sciences. Last August was the 40th field season, and the changes to these glaciers in 2023 were profound: one of the eight monitored officially disappeared, the Ice Worm Glacier. This is within the Skykomish River Basin, where six of the nine glaciers that existed in 1984 are gone. In the North Fork Nooksack River Basin the glaciers are receding quickly, but are not all on the verge of disappearing as some have a much greater volume to sustain. This project will tell these contrasting but similar stories of glacial networks and the river systems they support. It will tell the story of what happens when a glacier disappears: from the mountains where it occurs, through the landscapes its water feeds, and to the sea.
