Tag: Inuit

 A rocky peak or ridge that protrudes through the surface of a glacier or ice sheet — an island of rock in a sea of ice. Nunataks are refugia: during glaciations, plants and animals survived on these ice-free summits while the world around them was buried. Some of the genetic diversity of modern alpine species can be traced to populations that held on, isolated, on nunataks.

 A mound of earth-covered ice that forms in permafrost regions when water is forced upward through the frozen ground and freezes, pushing the surface into a dome. Pingos can be 200 feet tall and 2,000 feet in diameter. They are among the most striking landforms of the Arctic — solitary, symmetrical hills rising from an otherwise flat tundra. When a pingo collapses, it leaves a circular depression that may fill with water.

 A katabatic wind that pours off the Greenland ice sheet and down the coastal mountains, reaching speeds of up to 200 miles per hour. One of the most powerful winds on Earth. It occurs when cold, dense air pooled on the ice cap spills over the edge and accelerates downslope.