Glaciers in Motion – the Extreme Ice Survey

The Extreme Ice Survey has been capturing time-lapse photos of the flow and retreat of glaciers over weeks, months, and years. I recommend taking fifteen minutes to watch the survey lead, James Balog present some of the remarkable image sequences at the TED conference.

If you only have two minutes to spare, skip into the 16:10 point of TED talk video. Here, Balog narrates video that shows 1 mile of ice, 3 miles wide, and 3/5-mile deep break up into the ocean in only 75 minutes.

The Extreme Ice Survey website has dozens of videos of the time-lapse photography. Highlights include a enormous collapse caught on video and the Ilulissat glacier in Greenland (video embedded below) as it flows like water. The scale is awesome.