Glacier area and volume changes in the Mountain Altai (Russia) since the mid-twentieth century from space imagery data

Abstract

The paper examines changes in the area and volume of the Katun river basin glaciers, North and South Chu glaciers of the Altai Mountains since the beginning of the USSR glaciers inventarization to the present. For this purpose, we used USSR Glaciers Inventory data, space imagery – CORONA-1968, ALOS PRISM-2008, Landsat and ASTER 2000–2012. In total, glaciers have lost 172.4 km2 (27.4%) of its area.

Keywords

• горный алтай
• космические снимки
• сокращение ледников