This tourist attraction no longer exists

The thickness of continental glaciers in Norway has decreased by up to 10 percent over the last 12 months, according to the latest data presented on Thursday by the government agency supervising water management, NVE. This is a pace that has never been seen before in the history of measurement.

– We see the most dramatic changes in the north. The main problem is low snowfall in winter followed by hot summer, said Liss Andreassen, a glaciologist at NVE. She added that less snow and ice accumulates in winter than melts in summer.

The Engabreen glacier in the Nordland region was particularly affected. In 2024 alone, its front has retreated by 83 meters, or one fifth of what research conducted since 2014 indicates. The lengths of Austre Okstindbreen in Nordland and Steindalsbreen in Troms have been shortened by 80 and 75 m, respectively.

Until recently, western Norway was a safe place for glaciers. The moist wind blowing from the Atlantic Ocean brought enough rainfall to allow the ice cover to rebuild during the winter. However, since 2020, there has been much less snow in this part of the country in winter, and summer comes earlier, is hot and lasts longer.

For this reason, tourists this year lost the opportunity to admire one of the greatest attractions of the Sogn og Fjordane district – located in the Jostedalsbreen National Park, descending directly to the Nigardsbreen glacier lake. In 2024 alone, it retreated by 42 m, disappearing behind the rocky slopes of the surrounding mountains.

Last year, thousands of tourists sailed to the head of this glacier in boats, hoping for a unique view of the meeting of ice and water, but this year's summer finally determined the fate of this attraction. – This year it is no longer possible to see the face of the glacier from the photo point in the parking lot nearby – Andreassen pointed out.

Over the last decade, this glacier has retreated by almost half a kilometer.

Norway's most famous glacier, Hardanderjøkulen, is also getting smaller. The thickness of the ice in the places where the fifth part of “Star Wars” was filmed has melted by 15 m since the beginning of the century. The front of the glacier that played the planet Hoth in “The Empire Strikes Back”, the fifth part of the saga, has retreated by over 460 m since the beginning of the 21st century. – Each of our glaciers has lost an average of 200 meters in length over the last ten years and this process will continue, emphasized Hallgeir Elvehøy, scientist with NVE.

UNESCO and the International Meteorological Organization WMO have declared 2025 as the World Year for Glacier Conservation. March 21 will be celebrated as Glacier Day from next year.

Rice University in Houston, Texas, has prepared a list of “victims of the climate catastrophe” – glaciers that have already disappeared from the face of the Earth. So far, Breifonn and Juvfonne have reached it from Norway, a glacier where the oldest ice in continental Europe was found, estimated to be 7,600 years old in 2017.