Rubber duckies dropped into glaciers

Little yellow rubber duckies aren’t just for the bathtub.

Scientists from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) are using the toys to figure out how glaciers are melting and how they affect ice movement. NASA dropped 90 duckies down holes in Greenland’s Jakobshavn glacier last year to track how water moves through the glacier and why the movement of ice from glaciers into the ocean speeds up in the summer. Since global warming is increasing the melting of glaciers, the speed of glacial movement is particularly concerning because it could raise ocean levels The Jakobshavn glacier is responsible for seven percent of the ice flowing into the ocean off Greenland’s ice sheet.

“Right now it’s not understood what causes the glaciers themselves to surge in the summer,” NASA’s Alberto Behar told Reuters. It’s theorized that melting ice from glacial surfaces flow through holes to the bottom of the glacier, lubricating movement toward the coastline.

The ducks have all been stamped with the words “science experiment” and “reward,”along with an email address to encourage people to report their whereabouts. But so far none have been reported to NASA.

Scientists have also lost track of a football-sized probe with a GPS and measuring equipment that was dropped along with the duckies. “We haven’t heard back but it may take some time until somebody actually finds it,” Behar told Reuters. “These are places that are quite remote so there aren’t people walking around.”

This entry was posted on Friday, May 21st, 2010 at 2:37 pm and is filed under On the Fringe. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a comment, or trackback from your own site. Add to del.icio.us.