Greenland Coast from Above
April 21, 2004
Provided and copyright by: Rick Bucchino
Summary authors & editors: Jim Foster; Rick Bucchino
This photo shows a pair of formidable glaciers on the southeastern coast of Greenland flowing into the Denmark Strait. It was taken from an aircraft window, at about 38,000 feet (11,582 m), on a commercial flight from Sweden to the U.S in mid October of 1999. Only Antarctica has more ice than Greenland's impressive icecap. Glaciers such as the ones pictured above transport huge volumes of ice from from interior ice sheets down to the sea. The area where glacial ice collapses into a body of water, forming icebergs, is called the calving front. Note the floating, white icebergs which have broken off or calved from glaciers emptying into the Denmark Strait. Also notice the rather bright leading edge of the glaciers. Chunks of ice that rip away from the glacier leave behind comparatively clean "blue" ice.
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