Last Glacial Maximum (LGM)

The Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) refers to the time of maximum extent of the ice sheets during the last glacial period, between 26,500 and 19,000–20,000 years ago.

It was followed by the Late Glacial Maximum.At this time, ice sheets cover the whole of Iceland and all but the southern extremity of the British Isles.

Northern Europe is largely covered, the southern boundary passing through Germany and Poland, but not quite joined to the British ice sheet.

This ice extends northward to cover Svalbard and Franz Josef Land and eastward to occupy the northern half of the West Siberian Plain, ending at the Taymyr Peninsula, and damming the Ob and Yenisei rivers forming a West Siberian Glacial Lake.

In North America, the ice covers essentially all of Canada and extends roughly to the Missouri and Ohio Rivers, and eastward to New York City.

In addition to the large Cordilleran Ice Sheet in Canada and Montana, Alpine glaciers advance and (in some locations) ice caps cover much of the Rocky Mountains in the United States.In the Southern Hemisphere, the Patagonian Ice Sheet covers Chile and western Argentina north to about 41 degrees south.

Ice sheets also cover Tibet (scientists continue to debate the extent to which the Tibetan Plateau was covered with ice), Baltistan, Ladakh, the Venezuelan Andes and the Andean altiplano.

In Africa, the Middle East and Southeast Asia, many smaller mountain glaciers form, especially in the Atlas, the Bale Mountains, and New Guinea.Permafrost covers Europe south of the ice sheet down to present-day Szeged and Asia down to Beijing.

In North America, latitudinal gradients are so sharp that permafrost does not reach far south of the ice sheets except at high elevations.The Indonesian islands as far east as Borneo and Bali are connected to the Asian continent in a landmass called Sundaland.

Palawan is also part of Sundaland, while the rest of the Philippine Islands form one large island separated from the continent only by the Sibutu Passage and the Mindoro Strait.

Australia and New Guinea are connected forming Sahulland.

Between Sundaland and Sahulland, Wallacea remains islands, though the number and width of water gaps between the two continents are considerably smaller.

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