Glacier mass balance Vernagtferner, Ötztal Alps, Austria, 1889-2010

In this article, methods and results are presented for the analysis of the behaviour of an alpine glacier, the Vernagtferner, Oetztal Alps, Austria. Since 1601, the advances and retreats of Vernagtferner are documented and analysed with rising temporal and spa- tial precision. Early pictorial documents (from 1601 to 1844), high-resolution maps since 1889, mass balance investigations with the glaciological method since 1964 and meteorological-hydrological records and models since 1974 deliver, with increasing temporal resolution, a consistent pattern of the continual ice loss of this glacier over more than 30 years.

Hydrological and meteorological records from the Vernagtferner Basin - Vernagtbach station, for the years 1970 to 2001

The Vernagtferner region has a long tradition of glaciological research performed by groups from Munich. It started in 1889, when Prof. Sebastian Finsterwalder from the Technical University in Munich produced the first map of a complete glacier based on terrestrial photogrammetry. Since then, numerous maps of the glacier have been made, describing the change in surface elevation for more than a century. These maps form the basis of the geodetic method of glacier mass balance determination, which provides volume changes as average data for the period between two surveys, i.e. typically for 10 years. Since the start of the glaciological method on Vernagtferner in 1964, annual as well as winter and summer mass balance data are available continuously. But only since 1973, the construction of the Vernagtbach station, approximately 1 km below the glacier margin at that time, provided the means to record a larger number of hydrological and meteorological parameters with a temporal resolution of typically 1 hour.