The Big Melt British ColumBia’s glaCiers are reCeding— there is no doubt —But what does this mean for the future of the provinCe and its inhaBitants? By Andrew Findl Ay Steve Ogle 62 • B C m Illecillewaet Glacier viewed from Mt. Sir Donald B C m • 6 3 The IllecIllewaeT GlacIer Is one Mountains was really eye-opening this cooling phase. We’ve aborted that with of my geological touchstones. On fam- past summer. In places snow coverage climate change,” Menounos says. ily trips to the mountains, from the time was down to five percent of a glacier’s when I was barely old enough to form surface area, when in past years, 50 per- anyone who has ever gazed at, worked lasting memories, I spotted its silvery cent coverage is normal for midsummer,” in or travelled through the mountains of tongue licking down from the broad flat Menounos tells me over the phone from B.C. is having a conversation about gla- névé between Perley Rock and Glacier his office at UNBC. ciers. Mountain guides, backcountry ski- Crest. And over the years, I have watched Menounos developed an interest in ers and climbers have witnessed dramat- its steady retreat, like water evaporating mountains and glaciers as an under- ic changes; massive crevasses opening up in the desert. graduate in Colorado where he got into on glaciers where before there were none In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, climbing. A casual interest coalesced into and once-straightforward approaches William Vaux and siblings George Jr. and an academic focus while he pursued a rendered dangerous and exposed to Mary made numerous trips from their PhD at the University of British Columbia rockfall as ice retreats exposing uncon- home in Philadelphia to Rogers Pass, where he was studying the record of geo- solidated earth and rock beneath. making first ascents and taking a keen logic change captured in sediments of al- Jan Neuspiel, lead guide and owner of interest in glaciers. They were arguably pine lakes. Today, glaciology is a hot topic. Vancouver Island-based Island Alpine North America’s first pioneering glaci- Funded by the Hakai Institute, Menou- Guides, leads climbs and skis with cli- ologists. In 1887, William loaded a horse nos’ research associate Robert Vogt flew ents in both the Vancouver Island Ranges with glass film plates and a cumbersome above Vancouver Island last summer in a and the mainland Coast Mountains. This view camera, headed up the trail from the small plane equipped with LiDAR—a re- summer, he visited Matchlee Mountain, Canadian Pacific Railway’s Glacier House mote-sensing technology that uses laser just outside of Strathcona Provincial Park through the lush forest of the Illecillewaet near Gold River, half a dozen times, giv- Valley. He stopped at the point where the ing him the chance to observe up-close forest cleared enough to offer a full view a glacier in rapid retreat on the moun- of the glacier and set up his tripod. The tain’s north side. Thanks to extremely dry black-and-white photos he took show weather on Vancouver Island last winter, the glacier’s tongue reaching valley bot- Matchlee’s glacier was reduced to bare tom trees. Today, more than one hundred ice in June, lacking the winter snow cover years later, the change is dramatic. The Il- that feeds and nourishes glaciers. Be- lecillewaet has receded more than a kilo- tween visits, he says, he watched the toe metre, almost to the height of land visible recede by metres. from the Trans Canada Highway, leaving As a heli-skiing guide with Bella Coola behind a vast area of polished bedrock this makes Heli Sports, he has also witnessed pro- that in Vaux’s time was covered thick in found changes in the massive icefields ice thousands of years old. me wonder, that carve through the Coast Mountains. what will we Call The icy landscape is changing to the If There were any doubts that our cli- glaCier national park when point where glacier ski runs that were mate is changing rapidly, those were ban- once bankable routes for guides are no ished by the last two years of consecutive the park’s more than 130 longer skiable. In some cases, helicopters low-snow winters and hot, dry summers. glaCiers are extinCt? are even unable to land because once cre- In 2014 and 2015 glaciologists like Brian vasse-free zones have been transformed Menounos, professor of earth sciences in into treacherous icefalls littered with slots the geography program at the University and seracs. of Northern British Columbia (UNBC) and “On Vancouver Island, there’s always Canada Research Chair in Glacial Change, light to create incredibly detailed models been an understanding that these gla- recorded annual glacial retreat at three to of an objects’ surface topography. They re- ciers are at the end of their lives. They’re four times historical averages. Menounos corded surface lowering on some of Van- like ice cubes, some of them are so small,” co-authored the study Projected deglaciation couver Island’s pocket glaciers that hit six Neuspiel says. “On the coast it’s much of western Canada in the twenty-first century, metres in a single year. An extremely low more shocking to see the rapid change which was published last April in the jour- snowpack—which in 2015 in southwest because these icefields have a feeling of nal Nature Geoscience, and it paints a stark B.C. was less than 15 percent of normal permanence to me.” picture of what our province will look like for April—and searing hot summers are Ross Berg, a Whistler-based mountain in the future. Using a combination of field the obvious culprits. However, Menounos guide, says thinning glaciers is substan- observations and monitoring and climate is exploring a third factor compounding tially changing the way people move change models, Menounos and his team glacier melt: the impact of forest fires and through mountains. Some peaks have predict that at least 50 percent of Coast the resulting accumulation of soot on become un-climbable due to impassable Mountain glaciers and 90 percent of gla- glaciers, which darkens the surface and crevasses, while alpine rock routes are ciers in the Canadian Rockies and other causes ice to absorb rather than reflect getting longer as “new” rock is exposed interior ranges will have vanished by the solar radiation. The bigger picture issue by disappearing ice every year. end of the 21st century. is human-caused greenhouse gasses and “This summer, I was trying to free a Which makes me wonder, what will climate change. route on the Minaret in the Bugaboos. we call Glacier National Park when the “A lot of people think that what we’re The guidebook said the first pitch 5.9 park’s more than 130 glaciers are extinct? experiencing is part of a natural cycle, but [a method to grade rock climbs known “For me, flying over the axis of the Coast in reality we should be entering another as the Yosemite Decimal System] but 64 • B C m 1905 this image shows the size of the illecil- lewaet glacier more than 100 years ago. 2002 this compari- son photo from the same spot shows the extent of the deglaciation. Top: Whyte MuSeuM Of the Canadian RockieS v653/na-1354 BOttom: henRy vaux jR. B C m • 6 5 clean freshwater to thrive and the birds and mammals that depend on healthy ri- parian ecosystems. There’s another impact of glacier reces- sion that is starting to show its face more frequently: landslides. Last September, a torrent of mud and debris roared down the mountainside in Birken north of Pem- berton, destroying the home and prop- erty of Rob and Erin Stewart Elliott. The slide is believed to have been caused by a combination of heavy rain and unstable glacial till once entombed in ice. A moun- tain guide flying above the Coast Moun- tains this summer snapped a photo of a massive landslide event that swept across the Tiedemann Glacier. UNBC’s Menou- nos believes that we’ll experience more and more of these landslide events in the wake of retreating glaciers. If glaciers disappear to the extent that Menounos believes they will by the end of the century, the concern on a lot of minds is how to prepare for this new ice-free paradigm. That’s why in 2013 the Columbia Basin Trust (CBT) formed the Canadian Columbia Basin Glacier and Snow Research Network. The goal is to help coordinate research and efforts this 2015 lidar among a range of stakeholders, including image provides a detailed UBC, UNBC, Parks Canada, BC Hydro surface image of the and the BC Ministry Environment, to bet- illecillewaet glacier. ter understand the glaciers and snowpack of the massive Columbia River watershed when I was there, 20 metres of hard, gla- the face of a well-weathered mountain and their contributions to downstream cier polished, unprotectable slab stood in guide. From a mountain traveller’s per- water resources and ecosystems. As part front of this ‘first’ pitch,” Berg says. spective, glacier morphology is either an of a five-year-study that will conclude in Backcountry skiing in glacier country is inconvenience or an ever-changing route 2018, researches have been studying in also becoming a more serious undertak- finding puzzle that keeps the mountains detail six glaciers, including the Nordic ing than it was in the past when skiers fresh and challenging. and Illecillewaet, monitoring glacier size could count on a deep winter snowpack “Ten years ago it looked like that—now using both airborne LiDAR technology to bridge crevasses and bergschrunds.