Another wet season fails

In the last 10 years on the Northern Icefield, the "long rains" have ended by the first of June. If this holds true for 2009, a second consecutive wet season has failed. The 12-month interval prior to 1 June has been the "driest of the century" by far, with a net glacier-surface lowering of 1.3 meters at the weather station. As this volume of ice has evaporated and melted, dust has been concentrating at the surface, augmenting that present before the late-2006 snowfalls. And with snowfall unlikely over at least the next 4 months, the rate of ice loss could exceed that ever witnessed.

Mid-month snow

On 11 May, snow began accumulating on the Northern Icefield. Through this morning there has been ~4 cm of net accumulation. Not much in the context of most mountain locations - but enough to raise albedo considerably on the glaciers. Hopefully the event will continue for another couple weeks; Juliana Adosi at the Tanzanian Meteorological Agency tells me that the long rains are forecast to end at the end of the month.

-Doug Hardy, UMass Geosciences

Manuscript flurry

Three papers on Kilimanjaro glaciers have been submitted within the past month, and are now in the review process. The sole-authored encyclopedia entry provides a comprehensive overview of the glaciers characteristics and processes. The other two take rather different perspectives and will be sure to stimulate discussion. Stay tuned!

Submitted to The Holocene: Is the decline of ice on Kilimanjaro unprecedented in the Holocene? (Georg Kaser, Thomas Mölg, Nicolas Cullen, Douglas Hardy, and Michael Winkler).

Submitted to Springer’s Encyclopedia of Snow, Ice and Glaciers.: Kilimanjaro. (Douglas Hardy).

Submitted to Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA (PNAS): Glacier Loss on Kilimanjaro Continues Unabated. (Lonnie Thompson, Henry Brecher, Ellen Mosley-Thompson, Douglas Hardy, and Bryan Mark).

In the beginning, there was Carlos

The beginning of our work on tropical glaciers, that is. Carlos Escobar was our guy in 1996 as we set out to begin climate research on Volcan Sajama in Bolivia. Not just to reach the summit at 6,542 m, not just to camp there for days, but to operate the world's highest-elevation satellite-linked automated weather station. Carlos made it happen and kept it fun, first on Sajama, then on Illimani... the consummate guide who became a friend to us all. And the help and friendship came not only from Carlos, but the whole Escobar family, especially brother Jose Mauro, wife Grissel, niece Monica, Mateo and his other children. International projects can't happen without people like Carlos, who solve the problems and make all the stress of high-elevation research worthwhile.

Today, Carlos passed away after struggling for months with brain cancer. Carlos, our Guía Internacional de Montaña, co-author, Everest summiter just 3 years ago this month, and buen amigo. Compounding the normal emotions is a terrible feeling of helplessness; for all Carlos and his family provided us, not being there to help in such a difficult time is painful...

To all the Escobars, know that all who worked with Carlos and your family are thinking of him, and you. Memories of him live on with each of us. Be strong, live strong...

Doug and the UMass crew

Long rains late

April was another month of net ablation. There was a small snowfall event which began late in March (see 4/10 entry below), but otherwise there was only a few cm on ~21 April.

May could turn out to be snowy however, as it did in 2003 and 2007 following dry March and Aprils. Conversely, the long rains were finished entirely by this time in 2002, 2004 and 2006 - and failed completely in 2000.

At any rate, for the previous 12 month interval, mass balance on the Northern Ice Field has easily been the most negative of the decade.

Journal of Climate paper

A new paper has been accepted for publication in the Journal of Climate titled "Quantifying climate change in the tropical mid troposphere over East Africa from glacier shrinkage on Kilimanjaro" with authors Thomas Mölg, Nicolas Cullen, Douglas Hardy, Michael Winkler, and Georg Kaser. This group has been collaborating for several years; most are part of the Tropical Glaciology Group at the Univerity of Innsbruck.

The paper examines 19th century recession of the southern-slope Kersten Glacier, by backward modeling with a spatially-distributed mass-balance model. Results indicate that late-19th century precipitation was higher by +160 to +240 mm/yr, dominating the mass budget and producing a larger glacier extent. Today, the Kersten Glacier terminus is ~600 m higher in elevation, and the glacier is loosing mass at ~500 kg/m^2/yr.

-Doug Hardy, UMass Geosciences

Another dry month

Little snowfall on the Northern Ice Field between mid-February and 28 March, satellite telemetry indicates. Only one mid-month event of 2 cm. Then, a snowy interval 28 March to 2 April bringing ~6 cm of accumulation. Six centimeters isn't much, but it is enough to substantially raise the albedo and keep it elevated for several weeks. Hopefully more snow will follow...

-Doug Hardy, UMass Geosciences