Ghiacciaio di Val Torta
Past extents come from the Swiss Glacier Inventories of 1850, 1931, 1973 and 2016. Future extents are illustrative: each glacier’s projected area (OGGM, median of CMIP6 climate models) is removed from its lowest ice upward. About the scenarios. This glacier has no model run of its own; its future follows the typical path of glaciers its size.
Ghiacciaio di Val Torta is one of 1,400 glaciers in Switzerland, covering 0.03 km² in the canton of Ticino. Its ice spans 2,504 to 2,704 m and faces north. Its meltwater drains to the Po and on to the Adriatic. In 1850, at the end of the Little Ice Age, it covered 0.41 km²; by 2016 it had lost 92% of that area. Its tongue has been measured 30 times since 1970. In total it has retreated 105 m, about 2.6 m a year. Between 1985 and 2024 its surface dropped by 19 m on average. No glacier model run exists for it; on the map it follows the typical path of glaciers its size.
The record
Length change since 1970
Position of the glacier tongue, measured in the field almost every year. Hover for each measurement.
Thinning since 1985
Average change in surface height, from comparing elevation models made from maps, aerial images and laser scans.
Facts
Area over time
Past areas are the ice body this glacier belonged to at the time. Projections: OGGM median, SSP2-4.5.
- SGI id
- C33-04
- Canton
- Ticino
- River
- Po → Adriatic
- Basin
- Ticino
- Location
- 46.4695° N, 8.5386° E · swisstopo map
- Elevation
- 2,504–2,704 m, median 2,540 m
- Slope, aspect
- 22°, north
- Debris cover
- 0.02 km² (56% of the area)
- Inventory image
- 2018
More in the Ticino basin
Sources
- Linsbauer et al. (2021). The new Swiss Glacier Inventory SGI2016. Frontiers in Earth Science 9. doi.org/10.3389/feart.2021.704189
- Mannerfelt et al. (2022). Halving of Swiss glacier volume since 1931 observed from terrestrial image photogrammetry. The Cryosphere 16. doi.org/10.5194/tc-16-3249-2022
- GLAMOS – Glacier Monitoring Switzerland. www.glamos.ch
Relief: swisstopo swissALTIRegio. 1850 and 1973 outlines: Maisch et al. (2000), Müller et al. (1976), Paul (2004). Length, mass balance and volume change: GLAMOS releases 2025. All sources and methods.