Remarkable images capture the diversity of Earth’s ice formations

A giant, impossible icicle. Starkly exposed mountain slopes. Billion-year-old rocks behind a lone iceberg. And the view from within a glacial tunnel.

These four beautiful and moving images come from a new book, Our Frozen Planet by Michael Hambrey and Jürg Alean. It sets out to celebrate the cryosphere – the collective noun that describes the world’s ice in all its forms, from glaciers and ice sheets to permafrost and snow cover.

The main image shows ice that has formed around a waterfall near Giswil, Switzerland. Icicles growing from the top have fused with ice formations emerging from the bottom to create a giant ice column.

Pictured above is Bryce Canyon in Utah. The direction of a slope strongly affects how snow is distributed in mountainous areas. Almost all the snow has melted on the south-facing slope of this ridge, but a substantial cover remains on the shady, north-facing left side.

The image above shows Nordvestfjord, in Northeast Greenland National Park, where some of the world’s oldest metamorphic rock forms a backdrop to an iceberg reflected in the deep fjord’s waters.

In Switzerland’s Vadret da Morteratsch glacier (pictured above), meltwater has carved a tunnel through the snow and ice. The photo was taken from inside the tunnel in winter when no meltwater was flowing through.