Labs / Geography
Glacier Carves a Valley
Cool the climate and a glacier thickens, flows, and pushes down the valley; warm it and the ice melts back. As the ice grinds along, it slowly rasps the sharp river V into the broad, flat-bottomed U you see in glaciated highlands — and drops moraines wherever it stops. Drag up on the view to chill it, drag down to warm it.
length 0.00 kmthickness 0 mflow 0 m/yrshape V · 0%moraine —
What to try
- How cold does it need to get before the ice reaches all the way down the valley?
- Flip on the cross-section. How long does the ice take to turn the V into a real U?
- Steepen the valley slope. Does faster, thinner ice carve more or less than slow, thick ice?
- Grow a long glacier, then warm the climate. Why does the terminal moraine stay put after the ice is gone?
- Where along the glacier is the ice thickest and fastest — and is that where the deepest carving happens?