Satellite images from 1986 and 2019 show how the Ok Glacier has almost completely disappeared from the top of an Icelandic volcano. (Image credit: NASA/Landsat)
Two satellite images taken 33 years apart show the disappearance of a glacier in Iceland, becoming the first ice formation officially declared dead due to human impact on the climate.
Okjokull is a dome-shaped glacier surrounding the summit crater of the Ok (pronounced Auk) volcano, which is 3,940 feet (1,200 meters) high and located 44 miles (71 kilometers) northwest of Reykjavik. (The name Okjokull translates from Icelandic as “Ok Glacier.”)
In 1901, Okjokull's ice covered about 15 square miles (39 square kilometers), but when the first of two satellite images was taken in 1986, the remaining ice had shrunk to less than 1 square mile (2.6 square kilometers). By the time the second image was taken in 2019, the ice cover had shrunk to less than 0.4 square mile (1 square kilometer), according to NASA's Earth Observatory.
The glacier was declared dead in 2014 when Icelandic glaciologists determined that the ice had become so thin that it could no longer slowly slide down the slope under the force of gravity, meaning it had stopped moving for the first time in tens of thousands of years, according to a 2024 paper summarizing Okjokull's disappearance.
The glacier's destruction was depicted and explored in a 2018 short film called “Not All Right,” created by researchers at Rice University in Texas.
This 2003 photo shows Okjokull beginning to crack and collapse. Just over a decade later, researchers have concluded that it is no longer a true glacier.
In August 2019, around 100 people, including scientists and politicians, attended Okjökull's funeral at the foot of the Ok volcano, The Guardian reported. During the ceremony, a plaque reading “A letter to the future” was placed on the summit.
It reads: “Ok is the first Icelandic glacier to lose its status as a glacier. It is predicted that within the next 200 years all our glaciers will follow the same path. This monument is to show that we are aware of what is happening and what needs to be done. Only you know if we have done it.”
The plaque also lists the atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration, which was 415 parts per million at the time. By March 2025, that number had risen to more than 428 parts per million, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
In 2023, Iceland also established the world’s first iceberg cemetery, with ice-like tombstones erected for 15 major glaciers listed on the Global List of Glacier Victims, all of which are either dead or critically endangered, according to the United Nations. The list includes Washington state’s Anderson Glacier, which in 2015 became the first U.S. glacier to be officially declared dead.
Due to insufficient monitoring and debate over the actual size of glaciers, it is difficult to know exactly how many have been lost due to climate change, according to the National Snow and Ice Data Center. However, some researchers have estimated that up to 10,000 glaciers of varying sizes may have already disappeared due to climate change, The Washington Post reported in 2024.
TOPICS Earth from Space
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