Swiss glaciers still have fever

The published results of length variation of Swiss glaciers confirm the general recession trend of glaciers in the Alps observed since 1980. 79 glaciers showed a retreat in 2008, only 5 a small advance (with length gain between 5 and 10m), and 2 remained stationary. Notable the length loss of the Eiger glacier with 225m and Gorner glacier with 290m.

Legend: blue triangle: advancing glacier, yellow: retreating glacier, grey: stationary glacier

Legend: Percentage of advancing Swiss glaciers (blue), stationary glaciers (green) and retreating glaciers (red) in the last 100 years.

References:

Gletscherberichte (1881-2008). "Die Gletscher der Schweizer Alpen", Jahrbücher der Expertenkommission für Kryosphärenmessnetze der Akademie der Naturwissenschaften Schweiz (SCNAT) herausgegegeben seit 1964 durch die Versuchsanstalt für Wasserbau, Hydrologie und Glaziologie (VAW) der ETH Zürich. No. 1-124, (http://glaciology.ethz.ch/swiss-glaciers/).