Earth, the icy planet

Icebergs on Phantom Lake, Axel Heiberg Island, Canadian Arctic Archipelago. JA

Afternoon on Oberaargletscher in the Berner Oberland, Switzerland, looking towards to the peak of Oberaarhorn (3638 m). MH

A glaciated landscape, with the Snowdon range (1085 m) reflected in Llynau Mymbyr near Capel Curig , North Wales. The mountains last bore small glaciers about 12,000 years ago. MH

The Norwegian Arctic Archipelago of Svalbard is 60% covered by glaciers. In this spring photograph, heavily crevassed Nansenbreen is flowing rapidly into the sea which is here still frozen. MH

Extensive glaciers survive in the Cordillera Blanca of tropical Peru, but are rapidly receding. Here on Nevado Pirámide (5885 m), fluted snow on the steep slopes and ice mushrooms on the ridge crests produce avalanches that feed the glacier below. MH

Admiralty Sound between James Ross and Snow Hill islands off the tip of the Antarctic Peninsula, a conduit through which much of the ice from the break-up of the Larsen Ice Shelf is channelled, creating a hazard to shipping. MH

Tabular iceberg in the northwest Weddell Sea. An ocean current carries icebergs from the southern limits of the sea up the east coast of the Antarctic Peninsula, before spewing them out into the Southern Ocean. MH

Nuptse (7861 m) forms the SW end of the ridge begins with Mount Everest and encircles the great glacier amphitheatre known as the Western Cwm. This view of the peak is from the western lateral moraine of Khumbu Glacier which it supplies through avalanching. MH