Permafrost Pathways started two years ago with the goal of mapping the permafrost thaw and putting that data into the hands of the communities themselves. As human-caused climate change continues to warm the region and the permafrost melts more and more, the project is expanding.

Permafrost thaw is causing tundra to sink and pool water.

Alaska’s Arctic landscape is under assault from a warming climate, and it’s happening a lot faster than anticipated.

“It’s an area that I and some other colleagues have started thinking about: can you get methane forming in terrestrial environments? But it’s a very new area of science,” carbon scientist Katey Walter Anthony said.

Detailed study of satellite data has identified more than 200 lakes with active methane emissions.

On a rising tide, a line of bubbles from the mud under the water of Ugashik Bay can be observed rising forcefully to the surface.

Are the newly found sinkholes really new or are they just newly discovered? And how much of a concern at this point?