(2021) Standing on the ice sheet that covers 80% of Greenland, looking inland. Photo taken in mid-September after several days of freezing temperatures and a snowfall of a few inches froze the meltwater streams.

(2022) The edge of the Greenland ice cap in midsummer when streams of meltwater form between the mounds of ice. Gravel blown onto the icy crust makes this image resemble a pencil drawing.

(2022) The road’s end, known as Point 660, provides a benchmark for the effects of climate change. In 2001 when the auto testing project was active, vehicles could drive directly onto the ice cap from the end of the road. Now visitors walk down the steep gravel hill formerly covered by the ice cap in the foreground of this photograph. As the ice sheet melts and its edge recedes inland, it also uncovers permafrost (a layer of soil that is frozen year round). A print of this photograph is in the permanent installation at the Kangerlussuaq Museum.
 

(2022) 20 years ago, the ice cap that covers 80 percent of Greenland also covered the steep moraine on the left. The ice has since retreated inland. (A regional government official told me that the ice formerly covering the moraine has dropped 30 to 50 meters since then.) In July, a swiftly flowing stream filled by meltwater from the ice cap divided the ice cap edge from the melting permafrost of the moraine.

(2022) The Russell Glacier flows off the Greenland ice cap. The Danish Arctic Institute has photographs from the 1950s taken by glaciologist Borge Fristrup (see next image), who conducted research there over several season. The photos show that the face of the glacier has eroded considerably since then and the height has noticeably dropped. They are both in the permanent installation at the Kangerlussuaq Museum to show the impact of climate change on this local landmark.

(1955) The Russell Glacier flows off the Greenland ice sheet. Its front is located 25 km east of Kangerlussuaq. When my 2022 photograph is compared with one taken by Danish glaciologist Børge Fristrup in 1955 one sees the ice loss over those decades. Fristrup (1918-1985) participated in and led a number of scientific expeditions iand played a major role in investigations of the Greenland ice sheet. (Fristrup photo courtesy Danish Arctic Institute). A comparison of these two images is part of the permanent installation at the Kangerlussuaq Museum.

(2023) Meltwater flowing off the Greenland ice cap gathers force as it enters the river that flows past the Russell Glacier, which is part of the ice cap, eroding a cave that has been rapidly enlarging in the past few years.

(2022) Panoramic photo of the site where I made the 3D scan of the ice cap for the sculpture shown in the next image.

(2023). This sculpture was made from a 3D scan of a small section of the ice cap near Point 660 for the permanent installation at the Kangerlussuaq Museum. The dark blue represents the streams of water that had formed under the summer sun. To make the sculpture, first a series of photographs of the scene from different angles were processed into a 3D file using photogrammetry software. After editing the file with 3D modeling software, it was carved in high density urethane foam by a machine that can read 3D files. Since the ice is constantly changing — and melting — this is a permanent record of a temporary form.

(2022). 20 years ago, this rocky area crossed by visitors to Point 660 to walk onto the ice cap was covered by the ice sheet. As the ice sheet melts and its edge recedes inland, it uncovers the permafrost (a layer of soil that is frozen year round) to the sun. Without its cover of white ice to reflect the sun’s rays, the dark soil absorbs heat, melting the permafrost, so large cracks have now developed, exposing once-buried ice. Streams of meltwater run through these cracks in the summer.

Photographs taken on my first visit to Kangerlussuaq (a one-day visit as part of a tour in 2018, top) and when I returned four years later (bottom) show the extent of the ice loss over that period, in terms of the overall elevation of the ice, the portion extending into the river, and the portion over the dark gravel hill on the right. "Reindeer Glacier" is the local nickname for this portion of the ice cap. These photographs are part of the permanent installation at the Kangerlussuaq Museum.

(2022) A panorama of the town from the top of Black Ridge (elev. 360 feet), a hill overlooking the confluence of the river from the ice cap and the fjord leading out to sea (located where the bridge is). Most of the buildings were originally built by the American military which also blasted two channels beneath where the bridge is now so the area around the shore wouldn't flood during the summer melt season. The sites shown in the next 5 photographs can all be seen from right to left in this panorama, following the direction of the river flow. This photograph is part of the permanent installation at the Kangerlussuaq Museum.

(2022) A close-up of the wave-like patterns of silt on the rocks just before the town bridge where the river empties into the Kangerlussuaq Fjord. The river is fed by melting of the Greenland ice cap flowing off the Russell Glacier, which in the summer months is milky with fine glacial silt. As one scientist puts it, "By the time it gets to Kangerlussuaq and passes under the town’s bridge, it’s essentially a rock, soil, and sand smoothie."

The American military blasted two channels beneath where the bridge is now so the area around the shore wouldn't flood during the summer melt season. It has altered the ecology so that more silt flows into the fjord, so that where once there was a pier where boats could dock near town, the water is now too shallow. This photograph is on a two-page spread in the book The New Geologic Epoch (ecoartspace, 2023).

(2021) Every summer, the soupy mix of melted ice and fine glacial silt from the Greenland ice sheet settles in the fjord after passing beneath the town bridge. Here, as autumn arrives, the water level decreases, revealing semi-frozen mud — and quicksand. This photograph is part of the permanent installation at the Kangerlussuaq Museum.

Helen Glazer Signpost, Kangerlussuaq Airport (2021)
Unidentifed photographer, Andreas Lund-Drosvad with Signpost (1959) (Collection Danish Arctic Institute)

Kangerlussuaq’s iconic red and white signpost originally stood in front of this museum building, then the Danish Hotel before being relocated to the airport. In 2014 the signpost was renovated by Air Greenland, changing the flight times, adding cities, and removing the SAS company emblem from the top. Andreas “Suko” Lund-Drosvad (1899-1989) posed with the sign in 1959. He was came to Greenland in the 1920s and settled in Upernavik where he lived for many decades and established the Upernavik Museum. This pair of photographs is part of a permanent installation at the Kangerlussuaq Museum in a room devoted to my photographs juxtaposed with vintage photos of similar sites related to the town's history as a military and scientific research outpost.

(2022) A male Barren-ground Caribou (Rangifer tarandus groenlandicus) pauses on a flat rock in the hills above Kangerlussuaq on a summer evening. Members of the genus Rangifer are called caribou in North America and reindeer in Eurasia. Caribou are native to West Greenland and before the airbase, indigenous people would hike or travel by kayak from coastal settlements to hunt them during the summer months. Hunting caribou is still an important part of local culture, although the recently imported musk ox has also been added to the diet. This photograph is in the permanent installation at the Kangerlussuaq Museum.

(2022) The thousands of musk oxen (Ovibos moschatus) roaming the hills surrounding Kangerlussuaq today are descended from just 27 calves brought here from East Greenland in the 1960s in an effort to perpetuate the species and establish them in West Greenland. This musk ox was with a herd grazing in the hills east of Lake Ferguson. It was a long day of hiking on spongy steep terrain until we quietly managed to creep around a small hill and hide behind a rock about 25 meters away. For a little over 15 minutes they tolerated our presence. This photograph is in the installation at the Kangerlussuaq Museum.

(2022) The thousands of musk oxen (Ovibos moschatus) roaming the hills surrounding Kangerlussuaq today are descended from just 27 calves brought here from East Greenland in the 1960s in an effort to perpetuate the species and establish them in West Greenland. This musk ox was the male with a herd of females and calves in the hills east of Lake Ferguson. It was a long day of hiking on spongy steep terrain until my guide and I managed to sneak up to a small herd and hide behind a rock to photograph them. They tolerated our presence for about 15 minutes. The last one to come into view was the male, who looked up occasionally while grazing, then seemed to signal to the herd it was time to go by running toward them.

Helen Glazer, Musk Ox Transport Crates, Kangerlussuaq Museum (2023)
Technical Sgt. Jose Hernandez, USAF, Musk Oxen Relocation Crates (1986) (US National Archives)

27 musk oxen were introduced in Kangerlussuaq in the 1960s from East Greenland, where they are endemic, as an experiment by a Danish biologist. The effort was so successful that joint Denmark-US relocation operation to transport calves from Kangerlussuaq to re-establish a herd in Northwest Greenland was undertaken with the collaboration of the US Air Force and US Coast Guard. In 1986. In the bottom photo, storage containers for musk ox calves, numbered and identified male or female, were photographed before being loaded onto a US military transport plane. The crates were returned to Kangerlussuaq and stored on the edge of town until 2023, when they were moved behind the museum, which is also planning to redo a room for an exhibit devoted to musk oxen. The 1986 photo is installed next to my female musk ox photo at the Kangerlussuaq Museum.

(2022) An Arctic hare (Lepus arcticus) springs from the bushes in Old Camp. Its summer coat of gray fur will turn white as winter approaches. This photograph is in the permanent installation at the Kangerlussuaq Museum.

(2022) Looking up at the intricate engineering of the Sondrestrom Incoherent Scatter Radar dish, built in 1971 for atmospheric research in Alaska, moved to Kangerlussuaq, Greenland in 1982, where it has stood unused since 2018. It was originally moved there because there was a hole in the ionosphere just above that area that makes it easier to gather information from space. In 2023, the surrounding buildings where science personnel lived and worked were torn down to make way for a Canadian university research groups that is planning to reactivate it. This photograph is in the permanent installation at the Kangerlussuaq Museum with a vintage 1984 photo of the radar dish complex, known locally as Kellyville after John Kelly, the scientist who initiated the project.

(2022) Weathered triangular plywood markers weighted with rocks mark the outline of the site of Greenland’s first runway, originally prepared in 1928 on the Fossil Plains, a natural raised clay terrace alongside the Kangerlussuaq Fjord. The original runway served the University of Michigan Greenland Expedition, led by William Herbert Hobbs, which conducted meteorological research from a hilltop near Kangerlussuaq Harbor. This photograph is in the permanent installation at the Kangerlussuaq Museum.

Helen Glazer Rocket Launch Pad (2022)
Jørgen Taagholt Launch Pad with Rocket (1974) (Collection Danish Arctic Institute)

In the 1970s, concrete rocket launch pads for meteorological experiments were installed east of the base along the shore of Akuliarusiarsuup Kuua. Increased water flow from the melting ice cap have heavily eroded the banks in this section of the river, leading to the collapse of all but one of the original platforms into the river. The 2022 photo shows the only remaining platform on land. A historical marker placed on the roadside in 2019 states that two of these rocket launch pads remain, but the next photograph shows one that by 2022, one had fallen into the river. These photographs are in the permanent installation at the Kangerlussuaq Museum.

(2022) In the 1970s, concrete rocket launch platforms for meteorological experiments were installed along the shore of Akuliarusiarsuup Kuua, a river of meltwater that flows from the Greenland ice cap. The heavily eroded banks in this section of the river is evidence of how increased melting due to climate change has resulted in increased water flow, leading to the collapse of all but one of the original platforms into the river. A historical marker placed on the roadside in 2019 states that two of these rocket launch pads remain, but the next photograph shows one that by 2022, one had fallen into the river. In 2022, I found this one jutting out of the river. The preceding image shows a photo from 1974 of one of the experiments and the last remaining platform on land.

James Evans, Project Mailbag, Bluie West 8 (US Air Force photo in US National Archives)

A grader is used to level and grade a runway at Bluie West 8 (Sondre Stromfjord), Greenland, 14 July 1947. I have located all the photographs of the former Sondrestrom Air Base in the US National Archives at College Park, Maryland, and scanned the negatives in order to match them with similar locations or subjects as they appear today as part of my photo book project.

Bent Helmudt (1950-51), Kangerlussuaq Looking Toward Black Ridge (Collection Danish Arctic Institute)

Unlike other Greenlandic towns that have been settled by Greenlanders for generations, no permanent residents lived in Kangerlussuaq until construction of Sondrestrom Air Base by the US Air Force began in the 1940s. The bottom photo, made by a conscript in the Royal Danish Navy living at the base, documents how it looked before it was significantly expanded in the 1950s and ‘60s.

Jens Fabricius, Airport Building and Military Barracks (1961) (Collection Danish Arctic Institute)

The airport building has been altered and added to since 1961. Across the road once stood round-roofed Quonset huts housing soldiers at Sondrestrom Air Base. The next photo shows the same site today. Both this photo and the next one are hung together in the permanent installation at the Kangerlussuaq Museum.

(2022) The airport building has been altered and added to since 1961. Across the road once stood round-roofed Quonset huts housing soldiers at Sondrestrom Air Base (see previous photo). Both this photo and the one from 1961 are hung together in the permanent installation at the Kangerlussuaq Museum.

(2022) Erected over 60 years ago, this pair of decommissioned Cold War era radar dishes and radio terminal building left behind by the US military have become a landmark locals refer to as “Mickey Mouse,” as in, “Follow the road past Mickey Mouse...” Before dish technology became obsolete in the late 1980s, they served as relay antennae channeling communications to and from scattered radar sites as part of the Distant Early Warning missile defense system that stretched across the Arctic from Greenland to Alaska. I have located US National Archives photos of this installation taken in 1961.

(2022) Disconnected wood utility poles, wires cut, still line long stretches of road, remnants of the former base. Gradually they are being cut down and hauled to the junkyard, where they are piled like oversized Lincoln Logs dumped from a box. Greenland largely lacks waste disposal and recycling facilities, so most of the base infrastructure remains.

(2023) Tundra plants turned red and gold in September cling to a rock formation visible from a main road. In the 1980s American and Danish airmen referred to the black and white pattern lower right as "The Ayatollah" because they thought it resembled the turbaned Ayatollah Khomeini of Iran, who became notorious during the 444-day Iran Hostage Crisis in 1979-81.

(2021) Before the American Air Base was established in 1941, Kangerlussuaq was an annual hunting ground for indigenous Greenlanders who lived on the coast some 80 to 120 miles away, but not a place with permanent structures that they identified as home. The establishment of the town cemetery in 2012 represented a shift. Surrounded by a white picket fence typical in Arctic villages in Greenland and Canada, as of 11 years later it had just nine graves decorated with artificial flowers, framed photos, lanterns, and other objects bordered by stones. The nearby dark circle was the former site of an air base fuel tank; beyond is an expanse of gravel and glacial silt dubbed "Dust City" during base days and still called that. Photographed from Black Ridge, a hill approximately 300 feet in elevation.

(2022) Before the American Air Base was established in 1941, Kangerlussuaq was an annual hunting ground for indigenous Greenlanders who lived on the coast some 80 to 120 miles away, but not a place with permanent structures that they identified as home. The establishment of the town cemetery in 2012 represented a shift. Surrounded by a white picket fence typical in Arctic villages in Greenland and Canada, as of 11 years later it had just nine graves decorated with artificial flowers, framed photos, lanterns, and other objects bordered by stones.

(2022) Empty JATO containers — which originally contained rocket fuel — are ubiquitous outside Kangerlussuaq buildings as outdoor ashtrays.