Articles | Volume 18, issue 4
https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-18-1669-2024
https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-18-1669-2024
Invited perspective article
 | 
09 Apr 2024
Invited perspective article |  | 09 Apr 2024

Discriminating viscous-creep features (rock glaciers) in mountain permafrost from debris-covered glaciers – a commented test at the Gruben and Yerba Loca sites, Swiss Alps and Chilean Andes

Wilfried Haeberli, Lukas U. Arenson, Julie Wee, Christian Hauck, and Nico Mölg

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Cited articles

Alean, J., Schwendener, L. and Zemp, M.: Migrating boulders on the surface of Alpine valley glaciers, Geogr. Ann. A, 103, 1–16, https://doi.org/10.1080/04353676.2020.1850064, 2020. 
Amschwand, D., Ivy-Ochs, S., Frehner, M., Steinemann, O., Christl, M., and Vockenhuber, C.: Deciphering the evolution of the Bleis Marscha rock glacier (Val d'Err, eastern Switzerland) with cosmogenic nuclide exposure dating, aerial image correlation, and finite element modeling, The Cryosphere, 15, 2057–2081, https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-15-2057-2021, 2021. 
Andersland, O. B. and Ladanyi, B.: Frozen Ground Engineering, 2nd Edn., Wiley, ISBN 978-0-471-61549-1, 2003. 
Anderson, L. S. and Anderson, R. S.: Debris thickness patterns on debris-covered glaciers, Geomorphology, 311, 1–12, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geomorph.2018.03.014, 2018. 
Anderson, L. S., Armstrong, W. H., Anderson, R. S., Scherler, D., and Peter, E.: The causes of debris-covered glacier thinning: Evidence for the importance of ice dynamics from Kennicott Glacier, Alaska, Front. Earth Sci., 9, 680995, https://doi.org/10.3389/feart.2021.680995, 2021. 
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Short summary
Rock glaciers in ice-rich permafrost can be discriminated from debris-covered glaciers. The key physical phenomenon relates to the tight mechanical coupling between the moving frozen body at depth and the surface layer of debris in the case of rock glaciers, as opposed to the virtually inexistent coupling in the case of surface ice with a debris cover. Contact zones of surface ice with subsurface ice in permafrost constitute diffuse landforms beyond either–or-type landform classification.
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