Editing Ice sheet (section)

== Overview ==
[[File:Greenland_ice_sheet_USGS.jpg|thumb|upright=1.2|[[Greenland ice sheet]] as seen from space]]
An ice sheet is a body of ice which covers a land area of continental size - meaning that it exceeds 50,000&nbsp;km<sup>2</sup>.<ref name="IPCC_AR6_AnnexVII" /> The currently existing two ice sheets in [[Greenland ice sheet|Greenland]] and [[Antarctic ice sheet|Antarctica]] have a much greater area than this minimum definition, measuring at 1.7 million km<sup>2</sup> and 14 million km<sup>2</sup>, respectively. Both ice sheets are also very thick, as they consist of a continuous ice layer with an average thickness of {{cvt|2|km|mi|frac=2}}.<ref name="NSFfactsheet" /><ref>{{Cite web |date=21 November 2012 |title=About the Greenland Ice Sheet |url=https://nsidc.org/ice-sheets-today/analyses/about-greenland-ice-sheet |publisher=National Snow and Ice Data Center }}</ref> This ice layer forms because most of the snow which falls onto the ice sheet never melts, and is instead compressed by the mass of newer snow layers.<ref name="IPCC_AR6_AnnexVII" />

This process of ice sheet growth is still occurring nowadays, as can be clearly seen in an example that occurred in [[World War II]]. A [[Glacier Girl|Lockheed P-38 Lightning fighter plane]] crashed in Greenland in 1942. It was only recovered 50 years later. By then, it had been buried under 81 m (268 feet) of ice which had formed over that time period.<ref>{{cite web |title=Glacier Girl: The Back Story |url=https://www.airspacemag.com/history-of-flight/glacier-girl-the-back-story-19218360/?all |website=Air & Space Magazine |publisher=Smithsonian Institution |access-date=21 June 2020 |archive-date=21 June 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200621142843/https://www.airspacemag.com/history-of-flight/glacier-girl-the-back-story-19218360/?all |url-status=live }}</ref>