Post Little Ice Age changes in the Morsárjökull and Skaftafellsjökull proglacial landscape (Southeast of Iceland)

Erwan Roussel (1, 2) , Marie Chenet (3) , Armelle Decaulne (2)

1 MSH Clermont - Maison des Sciences de l'Homme de Clermont-Ferrand
2 GEOLAB - Laboratoire de Géographie Physique et Environnementale
3 LGP - Laboratoire de géographie physique : Environnements Quaternaires et Actuels

The Global Warming which started since the end of the Little Ice Age (mid-19th Century in Iceland), leads to the retreat of glacier fronts. Thus, the terminus of the Morsárjökull and Skaftafellsjökull glaciers, outlets of the Vatnajökull ice cap, have receded about 1 to 1.5 km since the LIA. This retreat induces new dynamics in the glacier foreland, especially related to glacial meltwater and recent deglaciated slopes development. Lichenometric measures on moraine ridges and paleosandurs provide the opportunity to reconstruct the evolution of the Morsárjökull and the Skaftafellsjökull the proglacial areas.

Mots clés: Post Little Ice Age; Sandur; Glacier Retreat; Slopes

Domaines: Géomorphologie

Erwan Roussel, Marie Chenet, Armelle Decaulne. Post Little Ice Age changes in the Morsárjökull and Skaftafellsjökull proglacial landscape (Southeast of Iceland). . 37 th Annual Arctic Workshop, May 2007, Skaftafell, Iceland. ⟨hal-00466850⟩