This pair of satellite images shows changes in two glaciers on the coast of Prudhoe Land in northwestern Greenland. The first was received on September 28, 1987 by the Thematic Mapper instrument on the Landsat-5 satellite, and the second - on September 30, 2017, by the OLI instrument on the Landsat-8 satellite.
The Tracy Glacier in the north and the Heilprin Glacier in the south are the largest glaciers that emerge into Inglefield Bredning, a fjord about 20 kilometers across.
Glaciers in the region retreated significantly in the 21st century due to atmospheric warming, according to studies published in 2018. From the 1980s to the 1990s, the Tracey and Heilprin Glaciers retreated at the same rate - about 38 and 36 meters per year, respectively. But between 2000 and 2014, the pace of their retreat diverged sharply: Tracy at this time decreased by 364 meters per year, and Heilprin - by 109 meters.
The difference is likely due to the way glaciers meet water. The Tracy Glacier is exposed to the 600-meter-deep seawater from below, making it more vulnerable to melting. The hailprin is in contact with shallow water, so it contracts more slowly.
NASA's Oceans Melting Greenland (OMG) field campaign aims to explore the role of the oceans in the melting ice of Greenland. At the same time, the Heilprin and Tracy glaciers are among those monitored annually from the air as part of the IceBridge mission.