The Grand Canyon of

Greenland Greenland ( kl, Kalaallit Nunaat, ; da, Grønland, ) is an island country in North America that is part of the Kingdom of Denmark. It is located between the Arctic and Atlantic oceans, east of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago. Greenland i ...

is a tentative canyon of record length discovered underneath the Greenland ice sheet as reported in the journal ''

Science Science is a systematic endeavor that Scientific method, builds and organizes knowledge in the form of Testability, testable explanations and predictions about the universe. Science may be as old as the human species, and some of the earli ...

'' on 30 August 2013 (submitted 29 April 2013), by scientists from the

University of Bristol , mottoeng = earningpromotes one's innate power (from Horace, ''Ode 4.4'') , established = 1595 – Merchant Venturers School1876 – University College, Bristol1909 – received royal charter , type ...

University of Calgary The University of Calgary (U of C or UCalgary) is a public research university located in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. The University of Calgary started in 1944 as the Calgary branch of the University of Alberta, founded in 1908, prior to being ins ...

, and

University of Urbino The University of Urbino "Carlo Bo" ( it, Università degli Studi di Urbino "Carlo Bo", ''UniUrb'') is an Italian university located in Urbino, a walled hill-town in the region of Marche, located in the north-eastern part of central Italy. The ...

, who described it as a mega-canyon. Ice-penetrating radar data collected during

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil List of government space agencies, space program ...

Operation IceBridge Operation IceBridge is an ongoing NASA mission to monitor changes in polar ice. It is an airborne follow-on mission to the ICESat satellite, continuing until after the ICESat-2 mission launch in September 2018. Program history From 2003 to ...

showed a huge subglacial canyonOskin, Becky,
'Grand Canyon of Greenland' discovered under ice sheet
, NBC News, August 29, 2013 running from the central region of the island northward into the

Arctic Ocean The Arctic Ocean is the smallest and shallowest of the world's five major oceans. It spans an area of approximately and is known as the coldest of all the oceans. The International Hydrographic Organization (IHO) recognizes it as an ocean, a ...

, to the

fjord In physical geography, a fjord or fiord () is a long, narrow inlet with steep sides or cliffs, created by a glacier. Fjords exist on the coasts of Alaska, Antarctica, British Columbia, Chile, Denmark, Förden and East Jutland Fjorde, Germany, ...

of the

Petermann Glacier Petermann Glacier ( da, Petermann Gletsjer) is a large glacier located in North-West Greenland to the east of Nares Strait. It connects the Greenland ice sheet to the Arctic Ocean at 81°10' north latitude, near Hans Island. The glacier and its ...

. The bottom of the canyon is below sea level; the canyon is likely to have influenced basal water flow from the ice sheet interior to the margin. Jonathan Bamber, a geographer at University of Bristol, stated, "The distinctive V-shaped walls and flat bottom suggests water carved the buried valley, not ice." The canyon is more than long, up to deep and wide, making it the longest canyon discovered on the Earth to date. There are, however, many canyons—including Arizona's Grand Canyon (1,857 meters) and Tibet's

Yarlung Tsangpo Grand Canyon The Yarlung Tsangpo Grand Canyon, also known as the Yarlung Zangbo Grand Canyon, the Tsangpo Canyon, the Brahmaputra Canyon or the Tsangpo Gorge ('), is a canyon along the Yarlung Tsangpo River (Tibet), Yarlung Tsangpo River in Tibet Autonomous ...

(overall 2,268 meters), previously the world's longest—that are deeper. The canyon predates ice sheet inception and has influenced basal hydrology in Greenland over past glacial cycles.

References

{{coord, 79.0000, N, 46.0000, W, source:wikidata, display=title 2013 in Greenland 2013 in science Canyons and gorges of North America Grand canyon Articles containing video clips