Thermal Effects of Crevassing on Steele Glacier, Yukon Territory, Canada

Abstract

Ice temperature measurements have been made in Steele Glacier to a depth of 114 m. All measured temperatures were below 0° C, the coldest being –6.5° C at a depth of 114 m. The temperature profile indicates an anomalously warm layer of ice between 30 m and 50 m, which is probably due to the freezing of water in crevasses opened during the 1965–66 surge. A two-dimensional model of a cold glacier with partially water-filled crevasses predicts temperature profiles very similar to that observed.