National’s Geographic’s Extreme Ice Project
National Geographic comissioned a team to conduct the world largest photographic study of the cryosphere (the portions of the Earth’s surface where water is in solid form and ground is frozen) ever attempted – in order to assess the rapid glacier melt and its implications on the future environment of our planet. And wow, did James Balog and his team find something amazing, beautiful and truly disturbing.
How’d they do it? Beginning in December 2006, photographer James Balog and his colleagues set up 26 solar-powered cameras at glaciers in Greenland, Iceland, Alaska, the Alps, and the Rocky Mountains. Each of the cameras were programmed to shoot a frame every daylight hour over three years to examine rapid glacier melt and its implications for the future. Not only was it a dangerous mission with harsh weather, but it was extremely successful mission. These images show the extent to which the glacial ice caps are melting, and quickly!
What does it all mean? Do the images put a chill in your bones, and not just because you are looking at ice? Over the past three decades, more than a million square miles (2.6 million square kilometers) of sea ice—an area the size of Norway, Denmark, and Sweden combined—have disappeared. And Balog’s images only enforce this devastating truth – glacial icebergs are becoming extinct.
2.5 billion people in the world don’t have access to adequate sanitation – that’s two fifths of the entire world’s population!
