MApping Glaciers’ Ice thickness along the CASCADES route
What is the motivation?
The ice thickness of most of Greenland’s peripheral glaciers is unknown or based only on rough estimates. This project fills that gap using a helicopter-based radar system. The resulting data will directly support studies on glacier dynamics, freshwater discharge from the Greenland Ice Sheet and future sea-level rise.
Why does it matter?
Glacier thickness is a key piece of information for predicting how quickly glaciers may disappear, how much meltwater they will release and how they contribute to global sea-level rise. Greenland’s coastal glaciers are changing rapidly, yet many areas remain poorly measured. By improving ice-thickness datasets, this project strengthens large-scale scientific efforts and helps clarify how these remote glaciers influence global climate systems.
Project Focus
The project aims to map ice thickness along a series of glaciers on Greenland’s west coast using a helicopter-based Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR). Measurements will target regions where no reliable thickness information currently exists or where uncertainty is high. The resulting maps will support broader scientific work, including sea-level modelling and estimates of freshwater fluxes from the Greenland Ice Sheet.
How will it be done?
The survey will use a lightweight, helicopter-borne GPR system called the Airborne Ice Radar of ETH Zurich (AIRETH). Suspended beneath a helicopter operating from the CCGS Amundsen, the system sends radio waves through the ice and records the echoes from the underlying bedrock. Flights will be carried out during suitable weather windows, and data will be processed directly on board, allowing survey plans to be adjusted as the expedition progresses.
What will be collected?
The project will collect radar reflections along flight profiles, which will be transformed into ice-thickness measurements and, potentially, information on internal ice layers through advanced data processing. Additional material will include GPS flight tracks, photographs and videos of environmental conditions, and field notes for each survey site to support interpretation of the radar data.
Members and partners
- Principal Investigator:
- Daniel Farinotti, ETH Zurich & WSL Sion, Switzerland
- Other participants:
- Ilaria Santin, ETH Zurich & WSL Sion, Switzerland
- Raphael Moser, ETH Zurich & WSL Sion, Switzerland
- Partners:
- Andreas Vieli, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
- Andrea Kneib-Walter, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
- Luke Copland, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, Canada
- Christine Dow, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Canada
- Christophe Kinnard, Université du Québec, Québec City, Canada
- Florent Gimbert, Université de Grenoble, CNRS, Grenoble, France
- Romain Millan, Université de Grenoble, Grenoble, France
- Evgeny Podolskiy, Arctic Research Center, Sapporo, Japan
- Shin Sugiyama, Hokkaido University, Sapporo, Japan
- Jakob Abermann, University of Graz, Graz, Austria
- Thomas Chudley, Durham University, Durham, United Kingdom
- Nanna Karlsson, Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland, Copenhagen, Denmark
- Alexandra Messerli, ASIAQ Greenland Survey, Nuuk, Greenland