Bluesky is becoming a home away from the HellSite for scientists. I recently “met” Mauri Pelto, whose bio describes himself thus –
Glaciologist who has spent 40+ years doing fieldwork on glaciers. Science advisor to NASA Earth. US Representative to the World Glacier Monitoring Service. Author of blog “From a Glaciers Perspective”. Grandparent, avid skier, dog walk/runner.
His googlescholar profile is here.
He kindly agreed to an email interview, and here it is.
- A little bit about you – who you are, where you were educated, “why glaciology”? I began working on glaciers in Alaska during the summer of 1981. The initial goal as to cross country ski in the summer to help me qualify for the US Ski Team. This worked, but I chose grad school instead in 1984 enrolling at the University of Maine. I designed the North Cascade Glacier Climate Project as a 50 year field project to monitor glaciers across the range. This was in response to a high priority of the National Academy of Sciences in 1983. At the time the USGS monitored a single glacier in several different ranges, and with the Reagan budget cuts was not going to be able to expand. The glaciers are all in Wilderness areas precluding the use of mechanized equipment and requiring backpacking to access. I chose not to seek federal funding and have financed the project with consulting work.
2. How and when you first heard about the issue of carbon dioxide build-up (presumably in your undergraduate degree?)
Terry Hughes was my advisor, he was very knowledgeable about ice sheets, while all my experience and insights were on alpine glaciers. I had a chance to work on Pine Island and Thwaites Glacier projects in 1985 and Jakobshavn Glacier in 1986. We , the glaciologic community understood these locations were key places where profound change was going to happen and set up projects to begin monitoring.
3. John Mercer wrote a famous (well, it’s all relative) paper for Nature, in January 1978 – do you recall reading it? Had you met him by then? Any recollections? I met John Mercer before meeting Terry Hughes. He had worked in Patagonia and Alaska areas I was more experienced with. I sought his guidance along with William O. Field about where to set up a project. He was not overly helpful.
4. Terry Hughes wrote a paper in 1980 about the “soft underbelly of the West AIS” – again, how did you know Terry, any recollections? I worked with Terry for four-years the first year working most of the time in his office with him. I finished my Masters and then PhD as quickly as possible in 1989. He was a brilliant, iconoclastic person.
5. How, from your perspective, has glaciology changed as a discipline over the years you’ve been involved (e.g. fleshing out the bsky comment)
I had a chance to address the glaciology community at the 100th anniversary AGU meeting in Washington DC in 2019. I pointed out that thirty five years prior all the glaciologists in the world could have fit in this room, that now held only as many people ~300 as worked on just the Helheim Glacier for example. This rapid increase in number of glaciologists was due unfortunately to the dire necessity that climate change posed for the cryosphere. That we need everyone of you to focus on what you do well and monitor, observe, develop and model that. That this generation of scientists was embracing collaboration instead of competition. This is why I have for 20 years incorporated artists in our research expeditions. Note below. I continue to work in the field every summer and with NASA on projects like the one published today.
https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/154764/alaskas-brand-new-island https://www.cbsnews.com/video/capturing-the-melting-of-glaciers-with-data-and-art/