Widespread movement of meltwater onto and across antarctic ice shelves

ABSTRACT Surface meltwater drains across ice sheets, forming melt ponds that can trigger ice-shelf collapse1,2, acceleration of grounded ice flow and increased sea-level rise3,4,5. Numerical

models of the Antarctic Ice Sheet that incorporate meltwater’s impact on ice shelves, but ignore the movement of water across the ice surface, predict a metre of global sea-level rise this

century5 in response to atmospheric warming6. To understand the impact of water moving across the ice surface a broad quantification of surface meltwater and its drainage is needed. Yet,

despite extensive research in Greenland7,8,9,10 and observations of individual drainage systems in Antarctica10,11,12,13,14,15,16,17, we have little understanding of Antarctic-wide surface

hydrology or how it will evolve. Here we show widespread drainage of meltwater across the surface of the ice sheet through surface streams and ponds (hereafter ‘surface drainage’) as far

south as 85° S and as high as 1,300 metres above sea level. Our findings are based on satellite imagery from 1973 onwards and aerial photography from 1947 onwards. Surface drainage has

persisted for decades, transporting water up to 120 kilometres from grounded ice onto and across ice shelves, feeding vast melt ponds up to 80 kilometres long. Large-scale surface drainage

could deliver water to areas of ice shelves vulnerable to collapse, as melt rates increase this century. While Antarctic surface melt ponds are relatively well documented on some ice

shelves, we have discovered that ponds often form part of widespread, large-scale surface drainage systems. In a warming climate, enhanced surface drainage could accelerate future ice-mass

loss from Antarctic, potentially via positive feedbacks between the extent of exposed rock, melting and thinning of the ice sheet. Access through your institution Buy or subscribe This is a

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* Log in * Learn about institutional subscriptions * Read our FAQs * Contact customer support SIMILAR CONTENT BEING VIEWED BY OTHERS A WEST ANTARCTIC GROUNDING-ZONE ENVIRONMENT SHAPED BY

EPISODIC WATER FLOW Article Open access 12 May 2025 ANTARCTIC BASAL ENVIRONMENT SHAPED BY HIGH-PRESSURE FLOW THROUGH A SUBGLACIAL RIVER SYSTEM Article 27 October 2022 THE PAST, PRESENT, AND

FUTURE EVOLUTION OF AURORA SUBGLACIAL BASIN’S SUBGLACIAL DRAINAGE SYSTEM Article Open access 20 March 2025 CHANGE HISTORY * _ 08 NOVEMBER 2017 Please see accompanying Corrigendum

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Antarctica 2003-2004 (MOA2004) Image Map_ http://dx.doi.org/10.7265/N5ZK5DM5 (National Snow and Ice Data Center, 2005) Download references ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS We acknowledge funding from NASA

grant number NNX14AH79G, NSF grant numbers GG008566 and 1443534, and the Old York Foundation. We also thank I. Cordero for assisting with meltwater feature digitization. We thank J. Lenaerts

for sharing RACMO2 climate model output. AUTHOR INFORMATION AUTHORS AND AFFILIATIONS * Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, Columbia University, Palisades, New York, USA Jonathan Kingslake, 

Indrani Das & Robin E. Bell * Department of Geography, The University of Sheffield, Sheffield, UK Jeremy C. Ely Authors * Jonathan Kingslake View author publications You can also search

for this author inPubMed Google Scholar * Jeremy C. Ely View author publications You can also search for this author inPubMed Google Scholar * Indrani Das View author publications You can

also search for this author inPubMed Google Scholar * Robin E. Bell View author publications You can also search for this author inPubMed Google Scholar CONTRIBUTIONS J.K. led the project

and the preparation of the manuscript. J.C.E. mapped surface drainage in selected locations. I.D. led analysis of climate model output. R.E.B., along with the other authors, assisted with

preparation of the manuscript. CORRESPONDING AUTHOR Correspondence to Jonathan Kingslake. ETHICS DECLARATIONS COMPETING INTERESTS The authors declare no competing financial interests.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION REVIEWER INFORMATION _Nature_ thanks A. F. Banwell, G. Flowers and the other anonymous reviewer(s) for their contribution to the peer review of this work.

Publisher's note: Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. EXTENDED DATA FIGURES AND TABLES EXTENDED DATA

FIGURE 1 DRAINAGE ON SHACKLETON GLACIER. A, WorldView 1 image showing a surface stream flowing from Shackleton Glacier, across the grounding line28 (black), onto the Ross Ice Shelf, from 11

February 2010. See also Fig. 2j. B, Shackleton Glacier surface profile extracted from Bedmap2 (ref. 30). C–F, Aerial reconnaissance photography over Shackleton Glacier from 12 January 2010.

Photo credit J. Stone, University of Washington, 2010. C, A large pond, P1, at the head of Swithinbank Moraine, SM. D, Meltwater ponds on SM. E, Further surface ponding on SM. F, A meltwater

channel, S5 running parallel to ice flow. Source data for this figure is available in the HTML version of the paper. EXTENDED DATA FIGURE 2 DRAINAGE ONTO AND ACROSS AMERY ICE SHELF. Landsat

imagery from 2015 (A), 1988 (B) and 1974 (C). The black boxes show the extent of Fig. 3b. Drainage basins computed from Bedmap2 (ref. 30) are shown in red in A. The drainage network that

feeds the large pond in Fig. 3b is shown in green and other major drainage systems are shown in blue. See inset in Fig. 3b for location in East Antarctica. The grounding line28 is in black.

EXTENDED DATA FIGURE 3 DRAINAGE ACROSS PINE ISLAND ICE SHELF. A, MODIS Mosaic of Antarctica (MOA)35 image showing the ice shelf and surroundings, including Pine Island Glacier (PIG). Inset

shows location in West Antarctica. White box shows the extent of the images in the other panels. B–H, Satellite imagery showing the growth of a melt pond during the 2013/14 melt season. The

grounding line28 is in black. EXTENDED DATA FIGURE 4 PERSISTENCE OF NINE SURFACE DRAINAGE SYSTEMS. Squares show the year of observations of surface drainage in each system. This figure

represents a lower bound on the occurrence of drainage in each location. Colours indicate whether the observation is from Landsat imagery, WorldView imagery, Aster imagery or aerial

photography. The vertical line at 1972 marks the launch of the first Landsat satellite. See Extended Data Table 2 for details. EXTENDED DATA FIGURE 5 PRE-SATELLITE ERA AERIAL PHOTOGRAPHY OF

PERSISTENT SURFACE DRAINAGE SYSTEMS. A–C, Oblique aerial photography of melt ponds on Roi Baudouin Ice Shelf, fed by surface streams. Inset shows location in West Antarctica. Look direction

is approximately northwards from the grounding line. The pond that appears on the right in A can also be seen in B and C. D, Aerial photograph of Shackleton Glacier, 9 December 1960, showing

meltwater features P1, P2 and S1, that are visible in more recent satellite imagery and aerial photographs (Fig. 2). EXTENDED DATA FIGURE 6 SURFACE DRAINAGE ACROSS THE RIISER–LARSEN ICE

SHELF. A, White box shows the location of the images shown in the other panels. Background image is from MOA. The inset shows the location in East Antarctica. B–E, Landsat images from 1974,

1984, 1988 and 2014. F, Enlarged view of melt ponds in E. In all panels the grounding line28 is in black. EXTENDED DATA FIGURE 7 DRAINAGE ON ROSS ICE SHELF, DOWNSTREAM OF DARWIN GLACIER. A,

The location of the other panels is shown in white, background image is from MOA. Inset shows location in Antarctica. B–F, Landsat satellite images showing meltwater ponding and drainage

crossing the grounding line28 shown in black, over a 40-year period. EXTENDED DATA FIGURE 8 ICE-FLOW SPEED AND PROXIMITY TO ROCK AND BLUE ICE AT SURFACE STREAMS. Proximity of upper ends of

streams to exposed rock (black) and blue-ice areas (blue) and ice-flow speed at the surface at the upper end of the streams, across the entire continent (solid curves) and further south than

75° S (dashed curves) (_n_ = 696). Source data for this figure is available in the HTML version of the paper. POWERPOINT SLIDES POWERPOINT SLIDE FOR FIG. 1 POWERPOINT SLIDE FOR FIG. 2

POWERPOINT SLIDE FOR FIG. 3 POWERPOINT SLIDE FOR FIG. 4 RIGHTS AND PERMISSIONS Reprints and permissions ABOUT THIS ARTICLE CITE THIS ARTICLE Kingslake, J., Ely, J., Das, I. _et al._

Widespread movement of meltwater onto and across Antarctic ice shelves. _Nature_ 544, 349–352 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature22049 Download citation * Received: 02 December 2016 *

Accepted: 08 March 2017 * Published: 20 April 2017 * Issue Date: 20 April 2017 * DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nature22049 SHARE THIS ARTICLE Anyone you share the following link with will be

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