Fletcher Ice Rise (), or Fletcher Promontory, is a large

ice rise An ice rise is a clearly defined elevation of the otherwise very much flatter ice shelf, typically dome-shaped and rising several hundreds of metres above the surrounding ice shelf . An ice rise forms where the ice shelf touches the seabed due t ...

, long and wide, at the southwest side of the Ronne Ice Shelf,

Antarctica Antarctica () is Earth's southernmost and least-populated continent. Situated almost entirely south of the Antarctic Circle and surrounded by the Southern Ocean, it contains the geographic South Pole. Antarctica is the fifth-largest cont ...

. The feature is completely ice covered and rises between

Rutford Ice Stream Rutford Ice Stream () is a major Antarctic ice stream, about long and over wide, which drains southeastward between the Sentinel Range, Ellsworth Mountains and Fletcher Ice Rise into the southwest part of Ronne Ice Shelf. Named by US-ACAN ...

and

Carlson Inlet Carlson Inlet () is an ice-filled inlet, long and wide, lying between Fletcher Ice Rise and Fowler Ice Rise in the southwest part of the Ronne Ice Shelf. It was named by the Advisory Committee on Antarctic Names for Lieutenant Ronald F. Carl ...

. The ice rise was observed, photographed and roughly sketched by Lieutenant Ronald F. Carlson, U.S. Navy, in the course of a

C-130 The Lockheed C-130 Hercules is an American four-engine turboprop military transport aircraft designed and built by Lockheed Corporation, Lockheed (now Lockheed Martin). Capable of using unprepared runways for takeoffs and landings, the C-130 ...

aircraft flight of December 14–15, 1961 from

McMurdo Sound McMurdo Sound is a sound in Antarctica. It is the southernmost navigable body of water in the world, and is about from the South Pole. Captain James Clark Ross discovered the sound in February 1841, and named it after Lt. Archibald McMurdo ...

to this vicinity and returning. It was mapped in detail by the

U.S. Geological Survey The United States Geological Survey (USGS), formerly simply known as the Geological Survey, is a scientific agency of the United States government. The scientists of the USGS study the landscape of the United States, its natural resources, and ...

from

Landsat The Landsat program is the longest-running enterprise for acquisition of satellite imagery of Earth. It is a joint NASA / USGS program. On 23 July 1972, the Earth Resources Technology Satellite was launched. This was eventually renamed to La ...

imagery taken 1973–74, and was named by the Advisory Committee on Antarctic Names for

Joseph O. Fletcher Joseph Otis Fletcher (May 16, 1920 – July 6, 2008) was an American Air Force pilot and polar explorer. Biography He was born outside of Ryegate, Montana on May 16, 1920, to Clarence Bert Fletcher (1884–1944). The family moved to Oklaho ...

, director of the Office of Polar Programs,

National Science Foundation The National Science Foundation (NSF) is an independent agency of the United States government that supports fundamental research and education in all the non-medical fields of science and engineering. Its medical counterpart is the National ...

, 1971–74. Between 2005 and 2007 extensive ground-based and

airborne Airborne or Airborn may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Films * ''Airborne'' (1962 film), a 1962 American film directed by James Landis * ''Airborne'' (1993 film), a comedy–drama film * ''Airborne'' (1998 film), an action film sta ...

radar surveys by teams from the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) were carried out, which obtained information about the thickness and internal structure of the ice mass, confirming operation of the

Raymond Effect Raymond Effect is a flow effect in ice sheets, occurring at flow divides, which gives rise to disturbances in the stratigraphy, showing unusual arches or anticlines called ''Raymond Arches''. The stratigraphy is detected by radio-echo sounding. Th ...

at the

ice divide An ice divide is the boundary on an ice sheet, ice cap or glacier separating opposing flow directions of ice, analogous to a water divide. Ice divides are important for geochronological investigations that use ice cores, since such coring is typic ...

. In 2011-12 further radar surveying was done by Guðfinna 'Tollý' Aðalgeirsdóttir and drilling through the ice was carried out by a BAS-led team. In consequence part of the Fletcher Ice Rise was named the by the

United Kingdom Antarctic Place-Names Committee The UK Antarctic Place-Names Committee (or UK-APC) is a United Kingdom government committee, part of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, responsible for recommending names of geographical locations within the British Antarctic Territory (BAT) an ...

References

{{usgs-gazetteer, id=5029 West Antarctica Filchner-Ronne Ice Shelf Ice rises of Queen Elizabeth Land

See also

References