The ice conceals a physical landscape.
Pyramid-shaped peaks, cliffs floating on the sea, and liquid lakes below kilometres of ice. Antarctica’s remarkable shapes become clearer when the slopes, displaced water and pressure are measured.
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FOLLOW THE ICE. MEASURE WHAT IT CONCEALS.A pyramidal peak drops 45 ° down the face and 35.3 ° along the ridge, a 9.7 ° difference. Glacial erosion carves this shape on peaks worldwide.
Compare the face with the ridge
02A visible 50 m cliff sits on 330.5 m of submerged ice, 380.5 m of column in total; dense ice alone would need 463.1 m. Set the freeboard and firn air.
Recover the submerged ice from the visible cliff
03The ice column loads 33.3 MPa against a melting boundary of 31.7 MPa, 1.6 MPa beyond it, so the lake stays liquid below zero. Set depth and temperature.
Test cold water beneath an ice column
Some exposed Antarctic peaks have triangular faces and sharp ridges that resemble pyramids.
02Antarctic shelf fronts can rise tens of metres above the sea, with much more ice hidden below.
03Lake Vostok holds liquid water beneath kilometres of Antarctic ice.
Some exposed Antarctic peaks have triangular faces and sharp ridges that resemble pyramids.
Their regular outlines reveal monuments buried under the ice.
Glacial erosion produces pyramidal mountain forms. Even a perfectly symmetrical model gives different face and ridge slopes; mapped Antarctic examples expose continuous geological rock bodies.
Read the full investigationAntarctic shelf fronts can rise tens of metres above the sea, with much more ice hidden below.
The visible cliff is a wall retaining the ocean at the edge of the world.
A floating shelf displaces seawater that supports its weight. A model with 50 m of freeboard and an assumed 10 m of firn air equivalent is about 380 m thick, including 330 m below water.
Read the full investigationLake Vostok holds liquid water beneath kilometres of Antarctic ice.
Liquid water reveals a warm, open hidden world below the frozen surface.
Pressure lowers water’s melting temperature. The modelled load beneath 3.7 km of dense ice supports liquid at −2.5°C, while geothermal heat and the surrounding ice govern its energy balance.
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