Incipient Glacier Development within Katmai Caldera, Alaska

• Published in: Journal of Glaciology
• Main Authors: Muller, E. H., Coulter, H. W.
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Cambridge University Press (CUP) 1957
• Subjects: Earth-Surface Processes; glacier; glaciers; Journal of Glaciology; Alaska
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0022143000024643; https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/S0022143000024643

Abstract An unusual opportunity for the study of glaciers in the process of development is afforded in Katmaicaldera in south-western Alaska. A violent eruption in 1912 destroyed the summit of glacier-clad Mount Katmai, creating a caldera 4 km. wide and 800 m. deep. Ice cliffs produced by beheading of the glaciers have since thinned and shrunk away from the rim of the caldera, except in the south-west. There, local reversal of direction of movement has resulted in an ice fall which descends part way down the crater wall. In the past thirty years two small glaciers have formed, near 1525 m. above sea level, within the caldera on large masses of slumped wall-rock below the north and south rims respectively. Elsewhere the sheer walls of the crater descend so steeply to the level of the caldera lake that permanent snowbanks cannot accumulate. The lake, which continues to rise at a rate of more than five meters per year, is at present the primary deterring factor in glacier development in the caldera.