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Blobrana


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Project INDEPTH
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Cornell geologist Larry Brown is leading the fourth stage of a nearly 15-year seismic profiling effort in Tibet. Project INDEPTH aims to discover how continents formed millions of years ago.
Project INDEPTH will cross the Kunlun Mountains, which form the northeastern border of the Tibet Plateau.
For nearly a decade and a half, Cornell geologist Larry Brown has been leading an international seismic profiling effort in Tibet, using explosions to probe the deep earth and discover how continents formed millions of years ago.
The project, called INDEPTH -- for International Deep Profiling of Tibet and the Himalayas -- has gone through several stages and now is a major international collaboration among scientists from the United States, China, Germany, Canada and, most recently, Ireland.
The National Science Foundation recently renewed funding for the project with a grant of $1.3 million to Cornell to finish the survey. Brown, professor of earth and atmospheric sciences, has been leading the project across the Tibetan plateau, located in the southwestern corner of China, since its inception in the early 1990s.
Tibet is one of the world's best examples of what happens when continents smash together, Brown explained, because of its famously high elevation and sprawling terrain. The Himalayas are thought to be have formed when the Indian continent slammed into Asia beginning about 50 million years ago.
The ultimate goal, according to Brown, is to piece together what happens when continents collide to form supercontinents like Eurasia. A common theory is that the Tibetan Plateau formed when India was pushed under Asia from the south.

"We'll be testing the hypothesis that, in fact, Asia is also being stuffed under the northern part of the plateau" - Larry Brown .

In order to do that, scientists must understand the geometry of rock layers under the Earth's surface.
The researchers use echo sounding, which is the same basic technology used to map the ocean bottom and explore for oil and gas. In Tibet, the scientists set up explosions that generate sound waves, whose echoes off the deep rock layers are recorded and analysed.
This allows an "acoustic photograph" to be taken as deep as 100 miles, but typically between 20 and 30 miles deep, said Brown, whose current work also involves deep imaging of major earthquake faults in Taiwan and an active volcano on the Caribbean island of Montserrat.
Future targets of Brown's work include sites in Brazil, Africa, Madagascar and India.

Source: Cornell University

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Blobrana


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RE: Mount Everest
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This image featuring Mt. Everest and Makalu was taken by an Expedition 8 crewmember on the 28 January 2004, aboard the International Space Station (ISS).

isseverest
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Credit NASA

Crewmembers on board the Station have a unique view of the world because of their position in a low orbit (360 kilometres) relative to satellites and their ability to look at any angle out the windows of the spacecraft. ISS crewmembers recently took advantage of their vantage point to photograph this oblique view of the Himalayas looking south from over the Tibetan Plateau. At first glance, one might think that the image looks like a picture taken from an airplane; until you remember that the summits of Makalu (left 8,462 meters) and Everest (right 8,850 meters) are at the heights typically flown by commercial aircraft, and could never be seen this way from an airplane.

Source

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Blobrana


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Himalayan glacier melting observed from space
The Himalaya, the “Roof of the World”, source of the seven largest rivers of Asia are, like other mountain chains, suffering the effects of global warming. To assess the extent of melting of its 33 000 km2 of glaciers, scientists have been using a process they have been pioneering for some years. Satellite-imagery derived glacier surface topographies obtained at intervals of a few years were adjusted and compared. Calculations indicated that 915 km2 of Himalayan glaciers of the test region, Spiti/Lahaul (Himachal Pradesh, India) thinned by an annual average of 0.85 m between 1999 and 2004. The technique is still experimental, but it has been validated in the Alps and could prove highly effective for watching over all the Himalayan glacier systems. However, the procedure for achieving a reliable estimate must overcome a number of sources of error and approximation inherent in satellite-based observations.

GlacierLoc
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Location map of the survey area

Read more (130kb, PDF)

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Blobrana


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Five Russian climbers left Kathmandu, Nepal on Monday to find a less treacherous approach to Mount Everest.

"This is our second attempt to find a new approach to the classic route of scaling the highest peak of the Earth -- Everest -- from the southern direction, from Nepal" - Valentin Bozhukov.

The classic route includes the Khumbu Icefall, a dangerous mass of ice permanently served by sherpas who throw crevice ladders with rope handles to get climbers across.

Source Tass

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Blobrana


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The Himalayas
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El Himalaya, el “techo del mundo”, en donde nacen los siete ríos más importantes de Asia, es también víctima del calentamiento climático. Con el fin de medir el deshielo de sus cerca de 33.000 km2 de glaciares, los investigadores desarrollaron un procedimiento, del cual son pioneros que consiste en el ajuste y, posteriormente, la comparación de las topografías de la superficie de los glaciares obtenidas con algunos años de intervalo, gracias a las imágenes de satélite. Los científicos calcularon que el espesor de los 915 km2 de glaciares himalayos de la región de estudio de Spiti/Lahaul (Himachal Pradesh, India) habría disminuido en promedio 0.85 m cada año, entre 1999 y 2004. Esta técnica, que sigue estando en fase experimental, fue validada en los Alpes, y podría resultar muy eficaz para monitorear el conjunto de los glaciares himalayos. Sin embargo, para lograr una estimación confiable, el procedimiento debe eliminar un buen número de causas de errores y de aproximaciones propios de las observaciones satelitales.

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Blobrana


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Roof of the World
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This Envisat image highlights the Tibetan Plateau in East Asia. With an average elevation exceeding 5000 metres and an area of 2.5 million square kilometres, it is the highest and largest plateau on Earth.
The plateau lies between the Kunlun Mountains to the north and the Himalayas to the south. The Himalayas, included in the Tibetan Plateau, are the world's highest mountain range and home to the world's highest peaks – Mt. Everest (8850m) and K2 (8612m).
Saline lakes abound in the plateau.
Earth's highest geological feature, referred to by Tibetans as the 'roof of the world', was created by the collision of two tectonic plates, the Indo-Australian and the Eurasian. This process, known as a reverse fault, is believed to have occurred some 55 million years ago when India crashed into Asia, causing the land to crumple and rise.
Data collected over four decades have showed glaciers covering the plateau are shrinking at a rate of 7 percent a year due to global warming. Just as changes in polar areas are good indicators of climate change, the plateau's glaciers are thought to be particularly sensitive indicators of climate variability.
Because seven of the world’s largest rivers, including the Yangtze and Yellow, begin on the plateau, it is a crucial water source for most of the Asian continent.

Himalayas
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Credit: ESA

This image was acquired by Envisat's Medium Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (MERIS) instrument on 26 October 2006, working in Full Resolution mode to provide a spatial resolution of 300 metres.

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Blobrana


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RE: Mount Everest Expedition
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The Indian Army has picked 20 climbers for an expedition that will in April attempt to reach the 8,850 metre summit of Mount Everest, the world's highest peak.
Lt Col I S Thapa of the Maratha Light Infantry will lead the expedition that is likely to be flagged off in the second half of March.

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Blobrana


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The Tibet plateau
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Temperatures in Tibet have hit record highs in recent days, as a scientific survey warned of the impact of global warming in the Himalayan region.
Friday's temperature in the Qamdo area of eastern Tibet was 21.8 degrees Celsius, 1.7 degrees higher than the previous record set for the same day in 1996.
In Dengqen county, also in eastern Tibet, the temperature reached 16.6 degrees Celsius on Thursday, 2.5 degrees higher than the previous record for the same day set in 2001.
Eight other places across the region also recorded record-breaking daily temperatures over the past few days.
Meteorological data in the Himalayan region began to be collected in 1970.
The Tibet plateau, seen as a barometer of world climate conditions, is experiencing accelerating glacial melt and other ecological change.
According to a recent geological study, the mountainous region's glaciers have been melting at an average rate of 131.4 square kilometres per year over the past 30 years.
Researchers who conducted the survey said that even if global warming did not worsen, the area's glaciers would be reduced by nearly a third by 2050 and up to half by 2090, at the current rate.
The survey, conducted by the Remote Sensing Department of the China Aero Geophysical Survey, also found a rapidly rising snow line, shrinking wetlands, and increased desertification compared with 30 years ago.
These problems will worsen as the glacial melt -- which has accelerated in recent years -- continues, further depleting the area's water resources, the researchers predicted.

Source AFP

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Blobrana


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Himalayan glaciers
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India and China have agreed to send an expedition to the Himalayas to study the impact that global warming is having on glaciers there.

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Blobrana


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A joint Indian-Chinese team plans to chart remote Himalayan glaciers that scientists fear are rapidly melting because of global warming, threatening the great rivers that give life to one of South Asia's most fertile regions.
The two expeditions, announced Thursday, will take scientists into some of the most remote areas of Tibet to explore the sources of two rivers that provide water for vast agriculture regions that feed nearly a sixth of the world's population.
Scientists will study the sources of the Sutlej and the Brahmaputra, two rivers which - like the better known Indus and the Ganges rivers - flow from the Himalayas into northern India where the fertile plains they feed form the backbone of a society that is still largely agricultural.
Almost every one of more than 300 large glaciers studied worldwide - from the Andes in South America to the Himalayas - is in retreat, international glaciologists reported in October in the journal Geophysical Research Letters.
The dangers faced by Himalayan glaciers have been exacerbated by India's and China's huge populations and fast-growing economies, which rely heavily on coal as an energy source. Burning coal is a major source of the gases scientists blame for warming the Earth.
Beginning in September 2007, expedition teams will explore the glaciers around Mount Gang Rinpoche, which is 21,778 feet high, and Mount Loinbo Kangri, at an elevation of 23,277 feet. Neither mountain has been scientifically surveyed in nearly a century.

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