In 60 years, more than 170 km2 of glaciers were lost in the Italian Alps, equivalent to the surface area of Lake Como

The climate crisis runs fast in the Alps and knows no bounds. Alpine glaciers are melting at an alarming rate and the mountains are becoming increasingly fragile: in 60 years, a glacial area of over 170 km2, equal to the surface area of Lake Como, has been lost in the Italian Alps. This is what Legambiente points out in the final balance of the Caravan of Glaciers 2025 campaign and on the basis of data provided by the Italian Glaciological Foundation, which, together with the environmentalist association and Cipra Italia this summer, from 17 August to 2 September along the Alpine arc, observed the state of health of a number of Alpine glaciers increasingly threatened by high temperatures, increasingly frequent zero temperatures at altitude, and the effects of extreme weather events that accelerate the melting of glaciers but also instability in the mountains with repercussions downstream.

There are eight glaciers, special observers, in this edition of Carovana dei ghiacciai: five in Italy - the Adamello glacier, in Lombardy, the largest in the Italian Alps, where the Carovana team organised its preview at the beginning of August, and then the Ventina glacier, in Lombardy, the Solda glacier in South Tyrol, and the Bessanese and Ciamarella glaciers, in Piedmont, in the Graian Alps - and three abroad - the Aletsch, the King of the Alps, and the Zugspitze glaciers, in Germany with the Schneeferner and the Höllentalferner. All share the same fate, frontal retreat and reduction in area and thickness. Surrounding them are mountains that change profile and colour, and an Alpine landscape in continuous transformation with ecosystems that advance by filling in the gaps left by melting glaciers. The only exception is the German Höllentalferner glacier, which, like the Montasio in Friuli, still resists with surprising tenacity.

The Caravan team observed the glaciers accompanied by the glaciological operators who share data with the CGI Foundation every year: this allowed valuable comparisons to be made between the current situation and that of the past. Glaciers are not only retreating, they are also becoming increasingly black, covered by debris flows and characterised on the sides by the formation of moraines, as is happening, for example, on the Solda glacier of the Ortles-Cevedale group, which is monitored by the Glaciological Service of the CAI South Tyrol. Here, in 2025, its front has receded by 26 metres compared to 2024, and debris flows and collapses, patches of dead glacier, as well as rock glacier are clearly evident, while on the other hand, forest and new ecosystems occupy the spaces where there was ice before. Another example is the Bessanese glacier in Piedmont. While in the mid-19th century, at the peak of the Little Ice Age, it occupied a large part of the Crot del Claussinè, extending over about 1.75 km2, today its physiognomy has completely changed (CGI data). Arpa Piemonte's technological monitoring has specified that its surface area has shrunk to 0.3 km2 and the volume loss suffered by the glacier was 3,900,000 m3 between 2010 and 2023, with an average subsidence of about 1 metre per year. Downstream of the glacier front, the proglacial area is occupied by an expanse of stones and debris, where there are numerous glacial lakes resulting from the melting of the glacier body. Mountains and glaciers are also increasingly fragile due to extreme weather events, such as the Ventina glacier in Lombardy, which has been monitored by the operators of the Glaciological Service of Lombardy and has been marked in recent years by flooding rains that have increased debris flows. Also of concern are the patches of dead ice that make the right side moraine unstable and access to the current glacier front risky.