Alaska Glacier Photos
Glacier photos from various regions of Alaska. All pictures on this site may be licensed as stock photos for business use, or purchased as fine art display pictures for home or office decor.
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Glacier photos
 Aerial view of Long glacier with multiple medial moraines (black lines of rock in the glacier) Wrangell St. Elias National Park, Alaska. © Patrick J. Endres
Grander than cities, great masses of compressed ice
carve through rock and earth, changing the land, creating
new valleys with power and patience only nature can fathom.
These Alaska glaciers move throughout the land, sometimes
ending with hundred-ton chunks of ice crashing into the
water.
Prince William sound in south-central Alaska is home
to some of the most spectacular and easily viewed glaciers
in Alaska.
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About glaciers
 Portage glacier is slowly retreating, forming Portage lake, a roadside tourist attraction just south of Anchorage, Alaska. © Patrick J. Endres
A recent concern is that Alaska's glaciers are shrinking,
possibly related to a warming climate. After analyzing
more than 2,000 glaciers in 11 mountain ranges and three
archipelagos -- including 780 glaciers that have names
-- federal glaciologists Bruce Molnia found that only
about a dozen of the large, named glaciers have advanced
during the past few years. We see this trend as glaciers
that were once tidewater no longer reach the ocean. While
this trend has been happening for several centuries, the
effects appear to be happening more rapidly
 Fireweed in full bloom, Brotherhood Park, Mendenhall glacier, Juneau, Alaska. Mendenhall glacier terminus, Juneau, Alaska. © Patrick J. Endres
Ice fields and an estimated 100,000 glaciers cover 5
percent of Alaska's surface and they are easily viewed
by visitors to Juneau, Valdez, Whittier, Seward, Anchorage
or the Matanuska Valley.
The pure-water runoff from the 27 mile-long Matanuska
glacier is used for drinking for a large part of Anchorage,
Alaska's largest city, and the surrounding areas.
Malaspina Glacier is the largest glacier in the state,
with an area of 1,500 square miles and extending 50 miles
from Mount St. Elias toward the Gulf of Alaska.
Glaciation of the Chugach Mountains and Prince William Sound
 Nunatak Mountain and Columbia glacier, Chugach mountains Prince William Sound, Alaska. © Patrick J. Endres
Recently, glaciologists examining sediments in the Gulf
of Alaska have discovered evidence of glaciation over
the past 5 million years. They suspect the area has been
glaciated for nearly 15 million years. Few other places
on the planet have experienced such a prolonged period
of glaciation. In cooler periods, glaciers covered all
of the coastal plateau. During warmer periods, they retreated
to the mountains.
 Tidewater Barry glacier calves into Prince William Sound waters. " © Patrick J. Endres
About 20,000 years ago, the Earth's climate cooled and
the last of the great Pleistocene ice age glaciers advanced
down from the Chugach Mountains. Glaciers formed in the
stream beds of the coastal plateau and carved deep valleys.
When the glaciers receded about 12,000 years ago, they
had scoured the Earth's crust down to the granite roots
of the Chugach range and scoured out deep fjords (glacially
carved valleys filled with sea water) creating Prince
William Sound and the rugged, glacially sculpted Chugach
Mountains.
 Meares glacier, Prince William Sound, Alaska. © Patrick J. Endres Prince William Sound, nestled in the coastal arc of
Alaska's Chugach Mountain Range, has over 20 glaciers
terminating at sea level; numerous others cling to precipitous
mountainsides. These glaciers form because warm, low pressure
systems sweeping in off the Pacific Ocean in the winter
encounter the high mountains, rise, cool and deposit their
excess moisture as snow. More snow falls in the long winter
than melts during the short summer. In fact, in the higher
elevations of the Chugach Mountains it is not uncommon
for snow to fall twelve months of the year. The thick,
accumulating snow layers compress into ice which gradually
flows down to the sea as glaciers.
Glacier Dangers
 Aerial view of crevasses in glacier on Mount McKinley, Denali National Park, Alaska. © Patrick J. Endres Snow can mask deep crevasses in glaciers. McKinley mountain
climbers rope themselves together not just to reduce the
danger of falls from steep slopes but also to reduce the
risk of falling into one of these hidden pits in the glaciers
on the lower slopes of the mountain.
Glacier Vocabulary
- Tidewater glaciers -- Glaciers that reach the sea.
- Freshwater glaciers -- Glaciers that
end in a lake.
- Valley glaciers -- Glaciers that end
in a valley.
- Hanging glaciers -- Glaciers that
descend part way down mountain sides.
- Receding glaciers -- Glaciers that
are melting faster than they are advancing. One of
the glaciers in Glacier Bay National Park receded
65 miles between 1794 and 1916.
- Terminal moraine -- the ridge of soil
that marks the furthest advance of a glacier before
it began to recede. Portage Lake was formed behind
the terminal moraine of Portage Glacier.
- Medial moraine -- Sometimes a dark
stripe can be seen running down the middle of a glacier.
That is pulverized rock that was pushed up between
two merging glaciers.>
Further reading:
Nancy Lethcoe, An Observer's Guide to the Glaciers
of Prince William Sound, Alaska. Available from Prince
William Sound Books P.O. Box 1313, Valdez, AK 99686.
Phone: 907-835-5175.
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The Mendenhall Glacier formed about 3,000
years ago. The glacier flows at a rate of about 2 feet per day
but because it descends into a warmer, maritime climate the
terminus melts faster than it grows and thus the glacier is
receding.
 Giant icebergs calve off the face of tidewater
glaciers and slowly melt away as they drift out to sea.
Tidewater glaciers that calve into
the sea can generate great waves, sometime with perilous results
in the form of small or large tidal waves.
Since 1767 Mendenhall glacier has receded
2.5 miles. Currently, the glacier is 12 miles long and terminates
in Mendenhall Lake. It originates on the "western snowfields
of the Taku Range" at an elevation of 5,500 feet and flows
down to 100 feet above sea level.
Medial moraine: Sometimes a dark stripe
can be seen running down the middle of a glacier. That is pulverized
rock that was pushed up between two merging glaciers.
Purple lupine decorate a meadow in Prince William Sound.
Kayaking in Harriman fjord, Chugach mountains and serpentine glacier in the distance.
The Coral Princess Cruise ship in College Fjord, Prince William Sound, Alaska.
Pool of water on the Root glacier, Wrangell St. Elias National Park, Alaska.
Tent glows under a full moon night on the Canwell glacier in the Alaska Mountain range, the Aurora borealis swirls overhead.
Links for more information on Glaciers:
All About Glaciers
USGS
Satellite image map of glaciers
Glaciers
in Alaska
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| Patrick J. Endres | P.O. Box 81312 | Fairbanks, Alaska 99708
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