The Upsala Glacier is a large valley

glacier A glacier (; ) is a persistent body of dense ice that is constantly moving under its own weight. A glacier forms where the accumulation of snow exceeds its ablation over many years, often centuries. It acquires distinguishing features, such as ...

on the eastern side of the

Southern Patagonian Ice Field The Southern Patagonian Ice Field ( es, Hielo Continental or '), located at the Southern Patagonic Andes between Chile and Argentina, is the world's second largest contiguous extrapolar ice field. It is the bigger of two remnant parts of the P ...

. Its higher portion lies in a

disputed territory A territorial dispute or boundary dispute is a disagreement over the possession or control of land between two or more political entities. Context and definitions Territorial disputes are often related to the possession of natural resources s ...

between

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in the western part of South America. It is the southernmost country in the world, and the closest to Antarctica, occupying a long and narrow strip of land between the Andes to the east a ...

and

Argentina Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the second-largest country in South America after Brazil, th ...

. While the glacier flows from north to south it has three lesser eastflowing tributary glacier: Bertacchi, Cono and Murallón. The

glacier terminus A glacier terminus, toe, or snout, is the end of a glacier at any given point in time. Although glaciers seem motionless to the observer, in reality glaciers are in endless motion and the glacier terminus is always either advancing or retreating ...

is at Upsala channel of

Lago Argentino Lago Argentino is a lake in the Patagonian province of Santa Cruz, Argentina, at . It is the biggest freshwater lake in Argentina, with a surface area of (maximum width: ). It has an average depth of , and a maximum depth of . The lake lies with ...

. The Upsala Glacier is well known for its rapid retreat, which Greenpeace cites as evidence for

global warming In common usage, climate change describes global warming—the ongoing increase in global average temperature—and its effects on Earth's climate system. Climate change in a broader sense also includes previous long-term changes to E ...

. Its retreat has been ongoing since the glacier was first documented in 1810. The name comes from the old spelling with one ''p'' of

Uppsala University Uppsala University ( sv, Uppsala universitet) is a public research university in Uppsala, Sweden. Founded in 1477, it is the oldest university in Sweden and the Nordic countries still in operation. The university rose to significance during ...

, which sponsored the first glaciological studies in the area. The university is located in

Uppsala Uppsala (, or all ending in , ; archaically spelled ''Upsala'') is the county seat of Uppsala County and the fourth-largest city in Sweden, after Stockholm, Gothenburg, and Malmö. It had 177,074 inhabitants in 2019. Located north of the c ...

, Sweden. The glacier showed almost continual recession up until 1999. The acceleration in ice motion during the two decades preceding 1999 may have been augmented by the release of backstress when the glacier retreated beyond the islands in Brazo Upsala. In 2008, another period of even faster retreat started, reported as being about 10 times faster than the period recorded in the eight years prior. As of 2018 Upsala Glacier has retreated to such degree that it no longer constrain its tributary Bertacchi Glacier. Likely this makes Bertacchi Glacier have higher flow rates reflected with a subsequent stretching and thinning out of parts of the glacier as well. At parts the velocity of flow is also thought to have increased in Bertacchi Glacier as result of the near-separation from Upsala Glacier.
Image:SantaCruz-Upsala-P2140135b.jpg, The Upsala, aerial view Image:Upsala Glacier.jpg, View from the Argentino Lake Image:Upsala Kayak Experience.JPG, Kayaking in the Upsala Glacier

External links

* Greenpeace campaign film showing th
retreat since 1928
*

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 ...

article on th
features of the Upsala Glacier

References

Glaciers of Chile Landforms of Santa Cruz Province, Argentina Glaciers of Argentina Glaciers of Magallanes Region {{SantaCruzAR-geo-stub

See also

External links

References