While this is the Greenland you would see from a satellite view, the ISS or your standard world map, It actually leaves out a lot of information from the actual topography of the land.
Underneath the 3km thick icesheet which covers an area around the size of Mexico, Lays another, hidden Greenland, full of mountains, valleys, canyons, islands, and potentially gigantic lakes and rivers.
Due to global warming, the ice masses of Greenland are rapidly decreasing, and the glaciers are estimated to lose between 70 and 90 cubic kilometers of ice every year, Which is around the same volume as western Europe's most voluminous lake, Lake Geneva.
While the retreating ice masses are disastrous for the world, since they are a driving force for the increase of global sea levels, It is also an opportunity for new insights into the heart of Greenland, which can teach us a lot about the past and the future of our planet.
The uncovering ice layers, which have been untouched for hundreds of thousands of years, for example, allow the studying of historic CO2 levels in the atmosphere and much more.
To put into perspective how little we actually know about the hidden land under the ice, In 2005, the retreating glaciers have uncovered the coastline of the areas north of the polar circle, revealing islands which were before assumed to be part of the landmass, And with the discovery of Schmidt Island in 2003, the most northern land point of plant earth was only discovered quite recently.
On a similar note, as recently as in 2013, a group of scientists from the universities of Bristol, Calgary and Urbino discovered the potentially largest canyon in the world, spreading 750km across Greenland's relief.
Using ice-penetrating radar, it is finally possible for humans to look underneath the seemingly impenetrable slab, and accurately document the real Greenland.
Even thought the surveying technology is consistently getting more precise, And our insights are far better then they used to be 10 years ago, there are still many unknows laying under the glaciers.
To understand what may await us under the ice, it helps to look at other formations on earth, who have also been shaped by growing and retreating ice masses.
