The end result, he argues, is that comprehending the scale of permafrost activity becomes challenging and is accessible only to specialists. With the elevation of the land changing from year to year as the ground thaws, current mapping programs can fall short in conveying the scale of permafrost thaw in the territory.

The GNWT offers an online map program too, though Rudkevitch says neither of them incorporate digital elevation despite the data being accessible online from Natural Resources Canada and the University of Minnesota.

Google Earth is not the only mapping resource available online. “That’s one of the main reasons why I did this, so I could start checking out some of these sites myself – because as you look across the map, you can really see a lot of them.” They’re not really looking for a visual,” he said. “Scientists are really looking for AI drive tools that could be based off this data. The same apparent slump seen on Logan Earth. What appears to be a permafrost slump in the Peel region, seen on Google Maps. While reports have shown landslides caused by permafrost are increasing in the North, Rudkevitch says it’s hard to visually understand just how many there are until you move across a map and see slump after slump, which are much more clearly defined using two-metre by two-metre pixels.

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