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Controls on Ice Cliff Formation, Distribution and Characteristics on Debris-Covered Glaciers
  • +11
  • Marin Kneib,
  • Catriona Lousie Fyffe,
  • Evan Stewart Miles,
  • Shayna Lindemann,
  • Thomas E. Shaw,
  • Pascal Buri,
  • Michael McCarthy,
  • Boris Ouvry,
  • Andreas Vieli,
  • Yota Sato,
  • Philip D. A. Kraaijenbrink,
  • Chuanxi Zhao,
  • Peter Molnar,
  • Francesca Pellicciotti
Marin Kneib
Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research

Corresponding Author:[email protected]

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Catriona Lousie Fyffe
Northumbria University
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Evan Stewart Miles
Swiss Federal Research Institute WSL
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Shayna Lindemann
High Mountain Glaciers and Hydrology Group, Swiss Federal Institute, WSL, Birmensdorf, Switzerland.
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Thomas E. Shaw
Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research
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Pascal Buri
Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research
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Michael McCarthy
Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research
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Boris Ouvry
Institute of Geography, University of Zurich
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Andreas Vieli
University of Zurich
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Yota Sato
Graduate School of Environmental Studies, Nagoya University
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Philip D. A. Kraaijenbrink
Utrecht University
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Chuanxi Zhao
Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences
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Peter Molnar
ETH Zurich
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Francesca Pellicciotti
ETH Zurich
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Abstract

Ice cliff distribution plays a major role in determining the melt of debris-covered glaciers but its controls are largely unknown. We assembled a dataset of 37537 ice cliffs and determined their characteristics across 86 debris-covered glaciers within High Mountain Asia (HMA). We complemented this dataset with the analysis of 202 cliff formation events from multi-temporal UAV observations for a subset of glaciers. We find that 38.9% of the cliffs are stream-influenced, 19.5% pond-influenced and 19.7% are crevasses. Surface velocity is the main predictor of cliff distribution at both local and glacier scale, indicating its dependence on the dynamic state and hence evolution stage of debris-covered glacier tongues. Supraglacial ponds contribute to maintaining cliffs in areas of thicker debris, but this is only possible if water accumulates at the surface. Overall, total cliff density decreases exponentially with debris thickness as soon as debris gets thicker than 10 cm.