Avalanches Feed Glaciers More Than Expected

1st December 2025

That’s according to a survey from the Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape.

It has been published in the open-access scientific journal Nature Communication.

See more here on Swiss Info

For the first time, researchers have estimated – for all of the more than 200,000 glaciers scattered across the planet – how much avalanches contribute to snow accumulation and thus to their mass balance, which is the difference between ice accumulation and melting.

• In the Alps about 11% of glacier snow comes from avalanches
• In the eastern Himalayas the share is 19%,
• In New Zealand it reaches 22%.
• In some cases, the contribution can exceed 50%

Swiss glaciers. Image c/o PlanetSKI