Open air laboratory Rofental and Hintereisferner

Rofental

In the Rofental (1891 – 3772 m a.s.l., Ötztal Alps, Austria) a consortium of institutions studies and monitors cryospheric, atmospheric, geomorphological, ecological and hydrological processes and their changes, with particular attention to the complex topography and climate settings of the Alpine terrain. The Hintereisferner is one central element of the Rofental research and besides its long-term glacier monitoring time series a test bed for various glaciological methods.

The glaciers in the Rofental have been monitored for decades and are frequently used as a test site for process studies, model development and evaluations and for new remote sensing or ground based methods in glaciological research. Automatic weather stations and long term precipitation gauges are distributed throughout the catchment. Runoff gauges at Vernagtferner and in Vent, and a network of rain gauges in the Rofental basin are the basis for high mountain hydrological studies. High resolution terrain models and geophysical techniques are used for monitoring and studying periglacial morphodynamics. These, and other, local datasets represent a unique time series of rich high mountain observations, that are invaluable for the development and validation of mountain earth system models.