The continued retreat of ice shelves on the Antarctic Peninsula has been widely attributed to recent atmospheric warming, but there is little published work describing changes in glacier margin positions. We present trends in 244 marine glacier fronts on the peninsula and associated islands over the past 61 years. Of these glaciers, 87% have retreated and a clear boundary between mean advance and retreat has migrated progressively southward. The pattern is broadly compatible with retreat driven by atmospheric warming, but the rapidity of the migration suggests that this may not be the sole driver of glacier retreat in this region.

Ice-front change may well be a sensitive indicator of regional climate change. We have studied the western Oates Coast from Cape Kinsey (158°50' E, 69°19' S) to Cape Hudson (153°45' Ε, 68°20' S) and the entire George V Coast, from Cape Hudson to Point Alden (142°02' E, 66°48' S). The glaciers here drain part of the Dome Charlie and Talos Dome areas (640 000 km2). A comparison between various documents, dated several years apart, has allowed an estimate of the surficial ice discharge, the ice-front fluctuation and the iceberg-calving flux during the last 50 years. The ice-front discharge of the studied coast has been estimated at about 90 ± 12 km3a−1 in 1989-91, 8.5 km3a−1 for western Oates Coast and 82 km3a−1 for George V Coast. From 1962-63 to 1973-74 the floating glaciers underwent a net reduction that continued from 1973-74 to 1989-91. On the other hand, from 1989-91 to 1996 the area of floating glaciers increased. Ninnis Glacier Tongue and the western part of Cook Ice Shelf underwent a significant retreat after 1980 and 1947, respectively. Satellite-image analysis of large icebergs has provided information about ice-ocean interaction and the existence of an “iceberg trap” along George V Coast. A first estimate of the mass balance of the drainage basin of Mertz and Ninnis Glaciers shows a value close to zero or slightly negative.

Noaa Avhrr and Landsat MSS imagery acquired between January and November 1986 has shown substantial changes in the Antarctic coastline near the Filchner Ice Shelf, Larsen Ice Shelf and Thwaites Glacier. In the Filchner Ice Shelf area some 11,500 km of ice calved from mid-April onward. In the Larsen Ice Shelf area two large bergs calved between February and August. The combined volume of ice from these two events equals approximately three years' normal calving from the entire Antarctic coastline. In the Thwaites Glacier area several changes appear to have occurred at the base of Thwaites Iceberg Tongue and Thwaites Glacier Tongue.