What’s Melting?
Whether on land or at sea, Arctic ice has been decreasing in recent years.
- Beaufort Sea: ice-covered in winter
- Sea ice (frozen ocean water) is decreasing both in the area it covers and in its thickness.
- Photo © RADM Harley D. Nygren/Department of Commerce
- Iceberg
- Icebergs are huge chunks of glaciers that broke off into the ocean. Ninety percent of an iceberg is below the water’s surface.
- Photo © Peter Hemming Photography
- Permafrost
- Permafrost is permanently frozen soil on land and on the shallow Arctic seafloor.
- Photo © Galen Rowell/CORBIS
- Greenland Ice Sheet
- Greenland’s immense ice sheet has thinned along the coastlines as melting has increased. Melting ice caps and glaciers can add water to oceans and raise sea levels.
- Photo courtesy of NASA
- Mountain glacier
- Most mountain glaciers have been retreating since the 1960s, with the trend speeding up in the 1990s.
- Photo © Chris Linder Photography