The shifting shape of Peyto Glacier
Will our children be able to ski the Wapta Traverse? It’s not looking good.
Once upon a time in 1996, I first met the Peyto Glacier. I was a young man leading my friends across the classic Wapta Traverse. After a late start and a slow day, we reached the tiny research station above the glacier, as the winds picked up and snow came down. Young and invincible, I wanted to continue on to the Peter and Catharine Whyte (Peyto) Hut. My friends were a bit less confident of my abilities in a whiteout. Rachel (my then girlfriend, now spouse) discovered the attic was open and four people lying down could just fit inside. The day was over. We spent the night in a horizontal broom closet. As we approached the Peyto Glacier the next morning, we could see that it covered the valley floor with only a small draw carved out by the summer stream of meltwater that flowed to the canyon. There was no place for a lake in this landscape.
Photo Doug Latimer
It would be some time before I skied on the glacier again, but once I became a guide I led groups from the Bow Hut to the Peyto Hut fairly regularly. On one occasion, and as is often the case on the Wapta, we had a bad weather day at the Peyto Hut, but I still had to entertain the guests. We decided to dig snow shelters in the wind rolls along the edge of the glacier. As I drove my shovel deeper into the snow it suddenly punched out a black hole. Further excavation revealed an ice cave. We anchored a hand line and descended into the darkness. The ice cave extended several hundred metres into the glacier before it was too distorted and deformed for us to continue.
Ice caves are formed by summer meltwater dissolving a subterranean drainage under the glacier. They are beautiful, but they also hollow out the glacier from the inside out. This ice cave must have been several kilometres long to reach the toe of the Peyto Glacier. After speaking with several guides it became apparent that the ice cave was at least 30 years old. One year I made a special trip to take my family, so they could see it too.
My first trip to the Peyto Glacier was in 1996 but it was 2010 before I skied directly on it. I was leading a group of skiers down from the hut and the medial moraine in the skier's centre-left of the glacier made navigation easy in the poor light. As we descended, visibility improved, but I became dizzy and disoriented. I knew exactly where I was, but the location made no sense to me. It took some time to realize that this was due to my vertical reference. Due to glacial recession, we were much deeper in the valley than my memory recalled or maps indicated. There should have been 100 metres of ice on top of me.
Photo Doug Latimer
My family joined me again in the fall of 2021 when we hiked in to assess the condition of the glacier. There were reports that the glacier was no longer passable on foot. When we arrived, the valley glacier was essentially gone, replaced with a lake and a mass of icebergs that had recently calved off the dwindling Peyto Glacier. It wasn't the recession of the glacier due to surface melt that astonished us, it was the holes in the glacier. Massive amounts of ice had melted and washed away from beneath the surface of the glacier and it was collapsing on itself. A giant ice cave more than 10 metres in diameter was exposed at the base of the glacier. Behind it, open water and a huge depression from unsupported surface ice.
When my son and I returned in the fall of 2022, the ice cave and depression had collapsed. The traditional summer access is now gone. It may be possible to ascend up the south side of the glacier, but it will require crossing the lake or outlet stream at some point. Winter access will remain viable for the short term, but as the ice recedes, emerging cliff bands may block future winter access. There will not be a glacier for my son to show his children.
Beyond aesthetic and recreational opportunities, does it really matter if the glaciers disappear? They are a very minor source of water that flows down our mountain streams and rivers. Geologically speaking ice ages or glaciations are relatively rare in the history of the earth. When we do have glaciations, the ice is in a constant dance of advance and retreat. Around 6,000 years ago in an event known as the Holocene Climate Optimum, most of the world’s glaciers and ice caps were smaller than today. During the Cryogenian Period (635-720 million years ago) it is widely believed that most of the earth was frozen solid, with a possible band of ice slush in the oceans at the equator. When we talk about climate, the only constant is change. And this is the key: change is normal, but the current rate of change is abnormal. Temperatures are rising at a rate that is much faster than we believe the earth has seen in the past.
As I mentioned, glaciers provide a fairly small percentage of the water flowing out from our mountains, but that water is released during the hottest days of summer and fall. Glaciers and icefields serve as reservoirs that buffer droughts and keep the rivers flowing out into the valleys and prairies when there’s no rainfall or snow melt. The cities and farmland downstream depend on this flow to survive heat waves. Unfortunately, these vital glacial reserves are drying up at the same time that heat waves are becoming more frequent.
In 2005, my wife Rachel produced a documentary looking at receding glaciers and water scarcity. The story was screened at six film festivals and broadcast on CBC. Looking back seventeen years later, the only significant error in the piece was the timing: the consequences are arriving sooner than expected. Rachel has put the documentary online and it can be viewed on Youtube.
When humans release greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere it does not instantly raise the temperature of the planet. Just like when we put a pot of cold water on a hot burner the water doesn't instantly boil, there is a lag. The lag for greenhouse gasses is believed to be around ten years. The current temperature that is melting our glaciers is the result of the emissions we released back in 2012. Even if we could magically stop emitting carbon dioxide and methane tomorrow, it will be 2032 before we see the full impact of this reduction. In the short term, we need to get out and love our glaciers, because this is a limited time offer.