Rocky Mountain dry: Remote sensing used by Jeff VanLooy (University Newsletter 03/01/16)

Straddling the Continental Divide in the rarified air 12,000 feet above sea level with only a satellite phone between you and the closest town some 22 miles away is not for the faint of heart.

But for UND glaciologist Jeff VanLooy it’s becoming a summer routine.

Every year since 2011, VanLooy has been leading teams of UND students on 10-day field expeditions to survey glaciers high atop the Wind River Range of the Rocky Mountains in western Wyoming. The area contains the largest glacial mass in the Rocky Mountains of the lower 48 states – even more than that of famed Glacier National Park in Montana.

As much as 70 percent of the life-giving water in this region comes from the mountain snowpack, and much of it eventually flows into Montana and North Dakota through the Missouri River system.

On years when higher temperatures and dry conditions conspire to keep snowpack low, a vast network of glaciers – 63 in all – serve as an important backup to quench the region’s thirsty river valleys.

The problem: the glaciers are disappearing.

Melting away
A Grand Forks native and assistant professor in the Department of Earth System Science & Policy (ESSP), VanLooy is interested in how much water these glaciers contribute to seasonal runoff, the rate at which they are melting and how much longer they are likely to be around. He’s also working with Associate Professor of Geography Gregory Vandeberg to study the water quality of the glaciers.

VanLooy says historical data combined with boots-on-the-ground observations and remote-sensing techniques indicate that the glaciers in this part of the Rockies – some 3- 4,000 feet higher than those at Glacier National Park – decreased two to three times faster since 1999 than they did in nearly four decades prior.

“There is no doubt that these glaciers are melting for sure, and very, very rapidly, so that is our concern,” VanLooy said.

Just as fascinating as the science that VanLooy and his student crew use to monitor glacier activity are the adventures they endure getting there.

“I couldn’t tackle all of the research I want to conduct in studying these glaciers if it were not for working across campus with Greg,” VanLooy stressed. “He is an excellent research partner to have.”

Adventures abound
A remote craggy wilderness nearly three-vertical-miles high, VanLooy’s research playground is rife with danger and furry neighbors, including black bears and mountain lions. His crew carries bear-repellent spray in their 80-pound backpacks as well as long metal “bear canisters” with all the food they’ll need: dried milk, jerky, granola and freeze-dried meals.

Then there’s the perils of the terrain – rock, ice and snow – with the ever-present threats of twisting an ankle, falling or getting smashed by a runaway boulder.

VanLooy called rock falls the biggest danger for his crew. He recalled a near-miss experience this past summer when a mini-van sized boulder rolled toward them only to be stopped when it smashed into an outcropping of rocks.

He said they also have to avoid falling into deep crevasses and so-called “moulins,” long, narrow tunnels or pipelines within glacial masses through which water flows.

“Putting together a research expedition like this is different than most any other kind,” VanLooy said. “There are just so many things to tackle. It’s a very active area but someone has to actually go up there and do the research.”

Two-day, one way
VanLooy said forest service rules prohibit his team from using any type of mechanized vehicle to aid in the trek to the top of Wind River Range. Even helicopters are not allowed in higher elevations apart from aircraft that specialized authorities use for rescue missions.

Chainsaws also are banned in an effort to keep the high wilderness as pristine as possible.

“So this means you have to go by horseback and foot to get to where the glaciers are,” VanLooy said.

Mules lug the equipment that’s not carried by the individual team members.

VanLooy said once the local outfitter, Derrick Sellergren with Blucher Creek Outfitters, reaches his limit by horseback, it’s typically another five miles by foot to reach the edge of the glaciers.

VanLooy and his research team then become the pack mules, lugging everything they’ll need for survival, sustenance and research, including flow meters, gauges and bottles to collect samples. It’s a two-day haul for the team.

What they consume as far as supplies during their missions is offset by the samples they collect and bring back on the return trip.

This past summer’s team of UND student researchers comprised Spencer Wheeling, Minot; Jacob Nordberg, Viroqua, Wis.; Emma Lord, Greenville, N.Y.; and Benjamin York, Harvard, Ill.

The students are well trained before they go, and VanLooy has nothing but kudos for their contributions.

“They were fantastic and physically fit,” he said of his most recent student crew. “They were beating me all over the place.  I could not do it without them.”

Living a dream
VanLooy, a Grand Forks Red River High School graduate, spent time in his childhood dreaming of conquering the world’s most extreme environments.

“I always used to go outside as a kid and play in the snow, and that led to pretending I was on expeditions,” he said.

The fantasy of it all soon turned to reality when VanLooy started joining his dad on recreational hikes through places such as Theodore Roosevelt National Park in western North Dakota and remote island settings on Lake Superior.

He also fell in love with maps and began to develop an interest in glaciology. While at the University of Idaho as an undergraduate, he was leafing through an atlas searching places that would be fun for him and his dad to explore next. That’s when he came upon the Wind River Range in Wyoming, littered with vast glaciers, including Continental Glacier a mass of ice two miles long by a half-mile wide.

“I remember thinking ‘Wow!’ – it would be cool to go backpacking there,’ and on top of that, there were glaciers.”

Homeward bound
VanLooy would go on to receive his bachelor’s degree in geography and cartography from Idaho. He also took on a two-month backpacking and skiing expedition over the Juneau Ice Field in Alaska, where he learned about glaciology, biology, climatology and how it all intertwines.

He did his master’s degree work at Kansas State and earned his Ph.D. from the University of Utah after writing his dissertation on remote sensing of glaciers in the coastal ranges of British Columbia.

Through it all, though, the glaciers of the Wind River Range were always on his mind.

After a stint as a professor at Radford University in Virginia, VanLooy noticed that a position had opened up in UND’s ESSP Department back in Grand Forks — home to both him and his wife.

VanLooy jumped at the opportunity.  He got the job and returned to Grand Forks in 2010. It wasn’t long after he started at UND that he was able to get support from his department to plan an expedition to the Wind River Range.

“And that’s where all of this really started to take off,” he said.

Field focus
VanLooy’s first assent to the high-Rockies’ glaciers came in the summer of 2011. In four years, his teams have been able to focus on Continental and Knife Point glaciers, the latter of which his team visited this past summer.

“Our goal has been to look at as many glaciers as possible, but it is very difficult, and even to this point, we have only gotten to two,” VanLooy said. “Now that doesn’t mean we have not studied a lot of the other glaciers. There are remote-sensing methods that we incorporate (with the help of UND’s Vandeberg) and combine with our field data to do the study.”

Using pressure transducers, flow meters and a portable radar that’s dragged across the ice, VanLooy is able to calculate an extrapolation for other parts of the glacier field.

Continental Glacier, alone, is associated with 10 other glaciers and glacierettes in its vicinity, while the Knife Point area comprises five substantial ice masses.  After extrapolations are calculated, VanLooy figures that the glacial runoff of these two areas may be contributing to as much as 35 percent of the stream flow to augment the surrounding area’s drinking and agricultural needs during the dry late summer season.

VanLooy says his team’s field research has found that Continental Glacier is as much as 185 meters thick, containing more than 17 billion gallons of water in frozen form.

If and when these glaciers disappear, a 35-plus percent decrease in contribution to stream flow would be a critical hit to the ecosystem and community water needs.

“What it comes down to is that all that water is going in to the Wind River, but there are still a lot more glaciers to study which are contributing just as much water or more,” he said. “We would like to get the rest of the data over the next few years.”

Important work
VanLooy’s early missions into the Wind River Range were funded by his department and a UND Faculty Seed Grant, but more recently the U.S. National Forrest Service has taken notice of his work and financially supported the research his team conducted this past summer.

VanLooy said his missions already have generated two published studies and one that’s currently under review, with two more planned from this summer’s work. He added that over the past 25 years there have only been a handful of other research campaigns similar to his that have resulted in published papers.

“This research is really important but I think sometimes it gets overlooked,” he said. “To get this kind of data, you really need boots on the ground so you can combine the remote sensing information with the actual field work.

“The reason there haven’t been many research expeditions like ours is because it’s hard to get there.”