/ Freya

Above normal accumulation rates in Eastern Greenland

The snow cover on Freya Glacier is usually 2 Meters thick in late winter. Repeated heavy snowfall events in February 2018 accumulated a snowheight of least 3.7 meters and burried our weather station in snow.

ext_abstr_fig_01-2
This graph shows the current monitoring network on Freya Glacier, with the automatic camera and the weather station, and the time series of winter- and annual mass balances since the start of the measurements.

ext_abstr_fig_02
Snow height and snow/firn ablation at the weather station on Freya Glacier. During the winter 2015/16 and 2016/17 typical winter snow heights are slightly above 2 meters, but in winter 2017/18 the snowheight on the site was approx. 4 meters.

_Acc_mass_change_Greenland_with_Freya_Glacier
This map shows the distribution of the accumulation anomaly in winter 2017/18 over Greenland. Source: Polarportal.dk. Freya Glacier lies on the northern East coast in an area of high positve accumulation anomalies. This will significantly influence the annual mass balance of Freya Glacier in 2017/18, which will most likely be positive.

Here the Press Release in German and with more details the ZAMG Website.