glacial retreat
Frozen mass shrinking
Glacial retreat is the shrinking of a glacier when melting and evaporation exceed snowfall accumulation.
The glacier doesn't physically move backward—it simply loses mass at its edges faster than it advances.
Climate scientists track glacial retreat as an indicator of global warming: Glacial retreat in the Alps has accelerated over the past century.
- moraineGlacier-deposited debris pile
- crevasseDeep glacial fissure
- melting iceFrozen water turning liquid
- global warmingRising planetary temperatures
- sea level riseIncreasing ocean surface height
ice sheet · cryosphere · glaciology · terminus · meltwater · drumlin · calving · Anthropocene · climate change · melting · rising seas · habitat loss · water scarcity · polar ice caps · polar regions · sea level · greenhouse gases · carbon footprint
- AntarcticaSouth Pole, Amundsen, Scott, penguins, ice sheet
- Ice Ageice age, mammoths, saber-tooth cat, mammoth, woolly mammoth
- Earth processesplate tectonics, erosion, weathering, volcanism, sedimentation
- glacierscrevasse, moraine, iceberg, firn, ice shelves
- Glacier BayGustavus, icebergs, calving, blue ice, crevasses
- Ice Age Featuresice sheet, permafrost, moraine, ice cap, drumlin
climate indicator
glacial retreatglaciation
Ice sheet spreading process
glacial period · global cooling · ice age · cooling period · Little Ice Age