‘Near the cusp’: Glacier experts fear warm winter could have drastic effects

'Just a couple bad years, and they'll no longer be an active glacier.'

SISTERS, Ore. (KTVZ) -- Heading into 2021, Oregon's glacial health was already showing signs of trouble.

In fact the Oregon Glaciers Institute recently completed the first survey since the 1950s of the Beaver State's glaciers which pointed to losses.

"Of the 36 named glaciers in Oregon, only 26 remain. We've lost about 30 percent of Oregon's glaciers," the institute's president, Anders Carlson, said Monday.

Carlson said this winter was projected to be a La Nina event, which the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration states brings warmer winter temperatures than normal in the Southeast, and cooler than normal in the Northwest.

But Carlson said the year is proving to have different weather patterns.

"In Oregon, the Pacific Northwest, it makes for a colder (season) that then transitions more of a rain than snow, and we've just not seen that happen this year," Carlson said.

Carlson explained that our snowpack is below average, which has him concerned after a summer that was tough on glaciers.

"That meant the summer had a long time to melt out," he said. "In some places, it looked like the glaciers accumulated no snow -- at least down in the Bend area, probably glaciers gained no mass, they only lost."

Carlson said that with the low snowpack, if the summer is fairly normal, the sun will melt the snow faster and the ice will be exposed more quickly.

"A way to think about it is like your long-distance swimmer in the ocean, well, you usually build up a layer of basal fat," Carlson explained.

Carlson maintained that while more research needs to be done to know where the glaciers' threshold is to still move and form, he is very concerned about glacier health, especially if these weather patterns continue.

"That is very much a worry, particularly in the Three Sisters region around Bend where there are some glaciers on South Sister, and also on all three of the Sisters that are near the cusp," he said. "Just a couple bad years, and they'll no longer be an active glacier."