Double Exposure - Photographing Environmental Change

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BLACKSTONE BAY

HENEY GLACIER

VALDEZ GLACIER

VALDEZ BAY

The Trans - Alaska Pipeline ends here in Valdez, not far from the site of the Exxon Valdez oil spill. Due to global warming, the town's namesake glacier has retreated beyond view.

The Valdez and Camicia are two of the many glaciers that were highly visible in this scene 70 years ago.

Most of the ice in the mountains, including Camicia Glacier, has thinned substantially. The Valdez has retreated two miles and thinned 34 stories.

Gradual adaptation has been a part of life during natural climate fluctuations. But climate change is now occurring much more rapidly, and it may cause the extinction of as many as one million species in the next 50 years. For example, a fungal infection driven by global warming is decimating frog and toad populations. The infection has wiped out two-thirds of an entire genus of Central and South American frogs, including the golden toad and the Monteverde harlequin frog.