MARKED CHANGES IN 43 YEARS

Dominion, Volume 28, Issue 87, 7 January 1935, Page 6

MARKED CHANGES IN 43 YEARS

Retreat of the Glaciers

VISIT TO GODLEY REGION OF SOUTHERN ALPS Dominion Special Service. Christchurch, January 5. Remarkable shrinkage of the glaciers of the Godley region of the Southern Alps since he first climbed, there 43 years ago has been noted by Mr. G. E. Mannering, a formep president aud founder of the New Zealand Alpine Club, who has just returned from a further visit to the region. The changes include both retreat of the terminal ice face of the Godley glacier and a general sinking of the ice level. He considers that the changes may be due to a gradual lessening of the amount of snowfall on the Canterbury side of the range. Mr. Mannering’s first visit to tlie Godley region was made in February, 1892, when he was accompanied by Messrs. M. H. Lean and J. AV. Annan. They crossed the Sealy Pass and on the West Coast side went to the lower end of the Concrete glacier. There Lean injured himself on the ice, and as it was impossible to take an injured man through the bush, the party returned over the pass.

The glaciers of the regibn, however, were known before this time. Sir Julius von Haast practically discovered thorn in 1862, and E. P. Seajy, after whom the pass is named, reached the saddle in 3870. T. N. Brodrick surveyed the pass in 18SS. Long-Continued Process. Tlie retreat of the ice of the terminal face of the Godley glacier and the general lowering of the ice level of the glaciers of the region were very marked, said Mr. Mannering. The retreat and sinking, however, were not recent developments. The changes were most marked in the terminal face of the Godley glacier. In 1892 the ice of this glacier reached to within a few chains of'the Classen glacier in its tributary valley. Even at that time the glacier had begun to retreat, and in the intervening 43 years the retreat had become very marked. The whole of the lower part of the glacier had sunk .about 200 feet, and the hut, standing-where the Fitzgerald stream joined the -Godley glacier, was built where formerly there had been hundreds of feet of ice. In von Haast’s time the ice of the Fitzgerald glacier practically joined the Godley ice, but, now it was separated by a gap of about 21 miles. Erosion and Sinking, The greatest retreat of tlie ice was on the east side of the terminal face, where it had gone back about a mile and a half. FormAly the terminal face stretched in a flat curve across the valley, but now it was a sharp tongue, with shrinkage on either side. Even the ppint of tlie tongue had receded a great distance. The recession on the eastern side had been hastened by erosion from the river, which debouched at the side instead of at the centre of the terminal face. Great changes were also to be seen at the head of the glacier on the Sealy Pass. There Mr. Mannering saw evidence of a very great subsidence of the ice, for the ice level of both the Godley glacier on the Canterbury side and the Concrete glacier on the West Coast side was much lower than it was 45 years ago. A ridge of rocks now crossed the pass almost entirely, whereas when Brodrick surveyed it in 188 S there was only one small hillock of rocks exposed on the long snow saddle then forming the pass. The appearance of the peaks themselves and the hanging glaciers on them had changed very little. It was possible still to identify, from photographs 40 years old, little snowfields on the flanks of the peaks.