Alaska Glaciers: An Introduction

Juneau's most popular attraction is the mighty, magnificent Mendenhall Glacier, located just 13 miles from downtown Juneau. Everything about the Mendenhall is massive: it's face is 100 feet tall and 1.5 miles wide, it's length is over 6 miles, and it's handiwork, the Mendenhall Valley, is immense.

Large as it is, the Mendenhall is just a tiny part of the Juneau Icefield, an expanse of interconnected glaciers that sits just behind the mountains next to Juneau, covers over 1,800 square miles and runs from the Taku River east of town to Berners Bay at the extreme western end of town.

Glaciers are mysterious and intriguing things. They put off an eerie blue color that can't be seen anywhere else but in the dense ice of a glacier. And while they appear to be sitting still, they are in fact constantly moving, flowing downhill out of the mountains like rivers. It is this constant movement that gives glaciers the power to shape the landscape.

Take a look around Juneau at the mountain peaks. Some are sharp and jagged, others are rounded. During the Wisconsin Ice age, the smooth mountains were underneath a massive glacier, whose movement ground them down and shaped their peaks. The Icefield of today is a remnant of that time.

Today, researchers from all over the world come to Juneau to spend a summer on the glacier taking core samples of ice and analyzing the quality of the air contained in tiny bubbles that lay trapped in the ice. From those samples, scientists try to understand global warming and changes to the earth's atmosphere.

Visitors wanting to experience glaciers have a multitude of options. Ground tour companies offer trips to the Mendenhall Glacier where the Forest Service operates a fine walk-up visitors center. Flightseeing companies offer aerial tours of the Icefield. Helicopter companies can take you up onto the ice for a short walk or a two-hour hike. Day boat tour companies offer tours of the twin Sawyer Glaciers in Tracy Arm southeast of Juneau. Glacier Bay National Park, with its incredible collection of tidewater glaciers and 3 million acres of wilderness, is just a short trip to the west.