As Greenland's climate changes, a new project preserves memories of a fading past

ILULISSAT, Greenland — When Cuno Jensen was a child, he would watch towering icebergs drift past his hometown, flowing out into Disko Bay.

“When we were kids, and we walked up there with our family or hunting for some of the birds, we saw huge icebergs,” he said as he drove through Ilulissat on Greenland’s western coast, about 300 kilometers (185 miles) north of the Arctic Circle. “And nowadays, when we look at the scenery … we can see some of the icebergs (but) not that tall or big as it used to be.”

Greenland is hard hit by climate change, the focus of an annual United Nations conference opening in Turkey this week. Thanks in large part to climate change, driven by the burning of oil, gas and coal, the Arctic is warming four times faster than the rest of the planet.

Recollections like Jensen's feature in a new project called “Mapping Memories,” led by Sweden-based research institute Nordregio, which aims to build and preserve a lasting record of the past before it’s too late.

An exhibit linked to the project opened in September at Ilulissat's Icefjord Center, billed as Greenland’s first visitor center, that is devoted to exploring the link between people and nature.

“If we do not document the people’s own stories, they will disappear when the people pass away,” said Karl Sandgreen, the center's director.

“We wanted to have the ordinary people’s experiences,” he said. “All the facts we get are told by the scientists, archaeologists, glaciologists, biologists. … We also want to have another perspective to document climate change.”

As Greenland’s ice melts, landscape shifts and climate changes. Jensen, a burly, 42-year-old father of three, said he fears his young children will not experience the same things he did.

“When we were kids playing around these hills, there was much more snow and the water was frozen and it was ice,” said Jensen, a corrections officer. “We could get out on the ice and fish. That’s nothing we can do today.”

Preserving memories of hunting and fishing traditions

Across the icy territory, climate change is not only transforming the landscape but eroding memories and traditions tied to it.

Thinning sea ice means some hunters can no longer ride their dog sleds. Waters are becoming less predictable for the island’s traditional fishermen.

So far, the “Mapping Memories” project features nearly 60 personal stories — including Jensen's — tied to specific locations in Greenland. Some describe homes threatened by thawing permafrost and changing weather conditions. Others document disappearing traditions and hunting routes.

Fisherwoman Karen Alaufesen recalls a spot at sea where she fishes for halibut with her husband and young son. Their numbers have been declining, she said.

Pensioner Kristian Petersen remembers his former hometown of Qullissat, a coal-mining settlement abandoned in 1972 after its mine closed. Six years ago, the abandoned town was struck by a devastating tsunami triggered by a landslide.

In Ilulissat, rising temperatures are thawing permafrost, causing buildings to sink and roads and pipes to crack.

Buildings sink and ancient relics emerge from the thaw

“Everybody can see a lot of buildings are sinking,” said Sandgreen, pointing to the town’s 19th-century history museum, its wooden staircase slanted as the grounds beneath it shift. “It is very, very easy to spot.”

Archaeological objects, including hunting tools dating back 4,000 years, are also emerging from the ice, he added.

The nearby Sermeq Kujalleq glacier is one of the fastest-moving and most active on the planet, sending more icebergs into the sea than any other glacier outside Antarctica, according to United Nations cultural organization UNESCO.

As the climate has warmed, the glacier has retreated and calved off chunks of ice faster than ever before, significantly contributing to sea level rise from Europe to the Pacific Islands, according to NASA.

A September report by the Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland said the Greenland ice sheet, a 1.7-million-square-kilometer (660,000-square-mile) ice sheet covering about 80% of the Arctic island, has now lost more ice than it has gained for 30 years in a row.

Signe Hillerup Larsen, a senior researcher at the survey, said she sees no scenario in which the ice sheet could regain its lost mass, let alone begin growing again.

“Even if it (the melting) would be slowing down, that would not be enough,” she said.

Sandgreen said organizers plan to expand the project with more interviews, including with communities in nearby Canada, and add them to an interactive map. They also want to inspire kids to do more to fight climate change.

“We want to develop it so all the people who have experienced this melting permafrost and climate change have a chance to tell their stories,” he said.