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Lookup NU author(s): Professor Bethan DaviesORCiD, Professor Rachel CarrORCiD, Dr Owen King
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0).
Himalayan glaciers have experienced significant area and mass loss since the end of the Little Ice Age (LIA; ∼mid-1800s to early-1900s), yet analysis of the patterns of recession and long-term, catchment-scale records remain scarce. Here, we reconstruct the extent and surface of glaciers at the LIA (∼1815 CE) in the Langtang Catchment, Nepal Himalaya, using geomorphological indicators and Balanced-Ratio (BR) method, and quantify the long-term (LIA-1964/2023 CE) and recent (1964 to 2023 CE) changes in glacier extent based on Corona (1964/1974) and Sentinel (2016/2023) imagery, while examining climatic, topographic, and glaciological controls. Between the LIA and 2023, total glacier area decreased by 78.46 ± 4.38 km2 (∼41.5%), while glacier numbers nearly doubled from 58 to 115 due to separation, fragmentation, and disconnection. Glacier area loss rates increased more than fourfold, from 0.11% a−1 (LIA:1815–1964) to 0.49% a−1 (1964–2023) with further acceleration after 2000 (∼0.79% a−1 during 2000–2016 and ∼ 0.5% a−1 during 2016–2023). Glaciers in the catchment experienced widespread thinning, reduced flow velocities, and rising equilibrium-line altitudes (ELAs), coinciding with pronounced elevation-dependent warming (∼0.3 °C dec−1 > 4000 m compared to 0.1 °C dec−1 at 3865 m a.s.l.; 1964–2023). Thinning progressively migrated up-glacier into accumulation zones, while rising ELAs increasingly intersected thinned and heavily crevassed icefall regions, driving glacier fragmentation and disconnection. Fragmented glaciers showed higher area loss, thinning rates, and reduced surface velocities, whereas disconnections in valley glaciers led to stagnation and degradation of debris-covered tongues. Our study highlights the critical need to assess glacier fragmentation and disconnection across the Himalaya. With enhanced warming at higher elevations, fragmentation and disconnection will likely become dominant mode of glacier recession in the region, with significant implications for future glacier evolution, meltwater availability, regional hydrology and associated geohazard
Author(s): Silwal G, Davies BJ, Carr JR, King O, Buzzard S, Carrivick JL, Baral P
Publication type: Article
Publication status: Published
Journal: Global and Planetary Change
Year: 2026
Volume: 264
Print publication date: 01/09/2026
Online publication date: 08/06/2026
Acceptance date: 03/06/2026
Date deposited: 12/06/2026
ISSN (print): 0921-8181
ISSN (electronic): 1872-6364
Publisher: Elsevier BV
URL: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloplacha.2026.105555
DOI: 10.1016/j.gloplacha.2026.105555
Data Access Statement: All data used in the study were sourced from publicly available data repositories (see Methods for further details). The glacier outlines from different periods and any additional data related to the analysis may be obtained through the direct contact with the corresponding author.
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