Measuring glacial movements in-situ is a challenging, but necessary task to model glaciers and predict their future evolution. However, installing GPS stations on ice can be dangerous and expensive when not impossible in the presence of large crevasses. In this project, the ETHZ Autonomous Systems Laboratory develops UAVs for dropping and recovering lightweight GPS stations over inaccessible glaciers to record the ice flow motion. This video shows the results of first tests performed at Gorner glacier, Switzerland, in July 2019. This project is a collaboration with ETHZ’s VAW (group of M. Funk), and is supported by armasuisse S+T, and the Swiss Polar Institute.
Guillaume Jouvet is a senior researcher at the ETH Zurich. This field note relates to tests performed at the Gorner glacier in July 2019 funded by a SPI Exploratory Grant.
Header photograph: © Guillaume Jouvet, all rights reserved
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