Each spring, the Canadian Arctic is the site of a fierce battle between water and ice. The flow of the Mackenzie River, swollen with meltwater, helps break up river ice and pushes north toward the Arctic Ocean. In some places, intact ice resists the pulses of water and spurs flooding. But spring warmth always prevails, and by summer the river flows freely into the Beaufort Sea.
These images, acquired one week apart in May 2020 with the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite, show just how fast the landscape changes at this time of year. In the May 23 image (left), the Mackenzie River and its tributaries are still mostly frozen. By May 30 (right), melt and ice breakup on the river had worked its way north of Inuvik.
The rush of fresh melt water, called a “freshet,” is important for the hydrology of the Mackenzie River Delta because it recharges groundwater and sustains lakes.
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Image via NASA Earth Observatory