The Asia Socety’s China Green project continues its series on the disappearing glcaiers of the Tibetan plateau with two new videos. From “On Thinner Ice: Everest’s Vanishing Glaciers”:
A quick visual tour of some of the world’s highest glaciers on the Himalayan Mountain Range and other regions on the Tibetan Plateau. With the match photography contrast, let’s trace back what these giant ice sheets looked like 80, 40 or 20 years ago and how much they have thinned down, or melted up into the air. These images document glaciers at the foot of Mt. Everest, those in eastern Qinghai Province and in Tianshan Mountains in Xinjiang, and also expanding lakes due to accelerated glacial meltdown and shrinking lakes thanks to a drying and desertifying trend in some areas at lower altitudes. The picture is bleak and alarming.
And from “On Thinner Ice: Disappearing Glaciers on the Tibetan Plateau”:
In the fall of 2007 and again in 2008, David Breashears traveled to the Chinese face of Mount Everest, a mountain he has summited five times. His goal was not the peak, but a series of ledges and outcroppings scattered among the glaciers that flow down Everest’s western side. Breashears was retracing the steps of Englishman George Mallory, who died in an attempt to be the first to stand on top of the world, and his surveyor, Oliver Wheeler.
Breashears carried with him photos taken in the 1921 expedition to survey Everest, three years ahead of Mallory’s fateful summit attempt. Returning to the exact same locations, Breashears meticulously recreated those shots, pixel for pixel.
