Type Piedmont glacier Width 26,000 m | Area 91,780 km² Location Greenland | |
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Terminus Greenland Sea
North Atlantic Ocean Terminis Greenland Sea, Atlantic Ocean | ||
Earth from space zachariae isstrom
Zachariae Isstrom (Danish: Zachariæ Isstrøm; Isstrøm being the Danish word for ice stream) is a large glacier located in King Frederick VIII Land, northeast Greenland.
Contents
Geography
It drains an area of 91,780 km2 (35,440 sq mi) of the Greenland Ice Sheet with a flux (quantity of ice moved from the land to the sea) of 11.7 km3 (2.8 cu mi) per year, as calculated for 1996, increasing to 15 km3 (3.6 cu mi) in 2015. The glacier holds a 0.5-meter sea-level rise equivalent.
Zachariæ Isstrøm has its terminus south of Lambert Land and north of Nørreland, near the Achton Friis Islands. It terminates into an embayment previously packed with multi-year calf ice.
Glacier retreat
Zachariæ Isstrøm broke loose from a stable position in 2012 and entered a phase of accelerated retreat as predicted in 2008.
From a state of approximate mass balance until 2003 it is now losing mass at about 5 Gt/yr. The ice velocity increased by 50% in 2000-2014. In 2015 it detached from a stabilizing sill and retreated rapidly along a downward-sloping, marine-based bed with substantial calving
