Frontal recession of Parkachik Glacier between 1971-2015, Zanskar Himalaya using remote sensing and field data

AbstractParkachik Glacier is located in the Suru sub-basin of the Upper Indus River, Zanskar Himalaya. The Glacier has been analysed using Corona KH-4B (1971), Landsat-TM (1999), field survey (2015), Google EarthTM (2015) and ASTER GDEM (2015) for frontal recession and area changes. Overall, from 1971 to 2015, the Glacier has retreated by 127 ± 0.09 m i.e. (0.75 ± 0.07%) at a rate of 2.9 ± 0.004 ma−1 with a simultaneous decrease in area from 49.5 to 48.8 km2 i.e. 740 ± 0.7 m2 (1.5 ± 0.09%) at a rate of 74 ± 0.7 m2a−1. However, during recent decade (1999–2015), the rate of glacier recession of 3.9 ± 0.004 ma−1 with a corresponding area loss of 500 ± 0.74m2 (1 ± 0.1%) was higher than the retreat rate of 2.3 ± 0.001 ma−1 and an area loss of 240 ± 0.02m2 (0.48 ± 0.08%) during 1971–1999. In the field, the evidences of glacier recession are present in the form of separated dead ice blocks from the main Glacier, recessional dumps/moraines, active ice calving activity and a small proglacial pond/lake at the termi...