A History of Jökulhlaups from Strandline Lake, Alaska, U.S.A.

Sturm, Matthew; Benson, Carl S.

doi:10.3189/s0022143000006602

Cited by 24 publications

(33 citation statements)

References 9 publications

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“…(Similar relationships between major glaciers and glacier-free tributary valleys elsewhere are described by Sturm and Benson, 1985;Booth, 1986;and Saunders and others, 1987). Beginning about 12,000 yr ago, climatic warming resulted in the final stagnation and retreat of glacier ice that ended glacier domination of the map area.…”

Section: Glacial Depositssupporting

confidence: 66%

Surficial geologic map of the Anchorage B-7 SE quadrangle, Alaska

Yehle¹,

Schmoll²

1988

Open-File Report

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Section: Glacial Depositssupporting

confidence: 66%

Surficial geologic map of the Anchorage B-7 SE quadrangle, Alaska

Yehle¹,

Schmoll²

1988

Open-File Report

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“…This topic is discussed here although no firm conclusions may be drawn. The overall mechanism that releases a flood from a supraglacial lake appears to be a combination of a hydraulic pressure gradient, local topography, ice fracturing and ice temperature (Bjö rnsson, 1974;Nye, 1976;Sturm and Benson, 1985;Boon and Sharp, 2003). The mechanisms driving the penetration are not well understood.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Owing to ice warming, the tongue may have become temperate and the water released through a subglacial conduit. In this case, the release mechanism involves lifting the ice off a critical seal (Sturm and Benson, 1985;Roberts, 2005;Sugiyama and others, 2008), resulting in collapse of the terminus. In any case, we believe that the glacier terminus was cold before 1892, forming a watertight cavity in contact with the bedrock.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Origin of the outburst flood from Glacier de Tête Rousse in 1892 (Mont Blanc area, France)

Vincent¹,

Garambois

Thibert³

et al. 2010

J. Glaciol.

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ABSTRACT. Extensive field measurements and historical data have been used to re-analyse the cause of the outburst flood from Glacier de Tête Rousse that devastated the village of Saint-Gervais-Le Fayet, French Alps in 1892, causing 175 fatalities. The origin of this disaster was the rupture of an intraglacial cavity in Glacier de Tête Rousse that released 200 000 m 3 of water and ice. All previous studies have concluded that the intraglacial cavity was formed from a crevasse that was filled and enlarged by meltwater. The re-analysis presented here suggests that the reservoir of the upper cavity did not originate as an enlarging crevasse. The origin of the meltwater reservoir was more likely a supraglacial lake formed before 1878 during a period of negative mass balance. Following a period of positive mass balance after 1878, the lake was hidden until the outburst flood of 1892. This means that such hazards may be detected by checking regularly for the formation of a lake on the surface of the glacier before it is hidden.

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“…Maag (1969) identified 125 lakes with ice dams on Axel Heiberg Island, Canada, and studies of several icedammed lakes in that country have been of major importance for the scientific understanding of jökulhlaups, for example, investigations of Tulsequah Lake, British Columbia (Marcus, 1960); Summit Lake, British Columbia (Mathews, 1965;Clarke, 1982;Mathews and Clague, 1993); Hazard Lake, Yukon Territory (Clarke, 1982); and Flood Lake, British Columbia (Clarke and Waldron, 1984). Post and Mayo (1971) identified 750 lakes behind marginal ice dams in Alaska; of these, many have been thoroughly researched, such as Lake George (Stone, 1963;Hulsing, 1981;Lipscomb, 1989), Snow River (Chapman, 1981) and Strandline Lake (Sturm and Benson, 1985). The largest observed terrestrial flood from a breached impoundment took place on 8 October 1986, below the ice-dammed Lake Russell, Alaska.…”

Section: Floods From Marginal Ice-dammed Lakesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Jökulhlaups in Iceland: sources, release and drainage

Björnsson¹

2009

Megaflooding on Earth and Mars

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GLACIAL LAKE OUTBURST FLOODS IN MOUNTAIN ENVIRONMENTS Helgi Björnsson 1 IntroductionFloods can happen where glaciers dam lakes in mountainous areas. Occurring in both the temperate and subpolar regions of the Earth, such floods are called débâcles in the European Alps, aluviones in South America and jökulhlaups in Iceland. A dam of ice or sediment blocks the water to form a lake, while drainage is initiated by an opening of the hydraulic seal, which can be broken either suddenly or gradually. The impounded water is released directly into river channels, and has a typical discharge that is orders of magnitude higher than when running as a direct result of intense ablation. In regions with active, ice-covered volcanoes, meltwater is repeatedly released in floods from lakes that collect at subglacial hydrothermal areas. Occasionally, these floods take place without any significant prior storage of water, since ice melts instantaneously in volcanic eruptions. During the largest glacial floods in history, discharges reached 106 m3 s_1. For comparison, the meltwater that was temporarily stored in lakes at the edges of downwasting Pleistocene ice sheets was released in bursts that were only one order of magnitude larger than this, even though the enormous volumes involved may have altered the circulation of deep water in the North Atlantic Ocean of the late Pleistocene era.Glacial outbursts can have pronounced geomorphological impacts, since they scour river courses and inundate floodplains. Outbursts result in enormous erosion, for they carry huge loads of sediment and imprint the landscape, past and present, with deep canyons, channelled scabland, ridges standing parallel to the direction of flow, sediment deposited on outwash plains, coarse boulders strewn along riverbanks, kettleholes where massive ice blocks have become stranded and have melted, and breached terminal moraines. Some modern outbursts have produced flood waves in coastal waters (tsunamis). In the North Atlantic, outburst sediments dumped onto the continental shelf and slope have been transported great distances by turbid currents. Outburst floods wreak havoc along their paths, threatening people and livestock, destroying vegetated lowlands, devastating farms, disrupting infrastructure such as roads, bridges and power lines, and threatening hydroelectric plants on glacially fed rivers.Knowledge of jökulhlaup behaviour is essential for recognizing potential or imminent hazards, predicting and warning of occurrences, enacting preventive measures, assessing consequences and responding for the purpose of civil defence. The goal of this chapter is to outline and describe the following: (1) the location and geometry of glacial flood sources, including the properties of dams that impound the water; (2) the accumulation of water leading to outbursts and the conditions in which they begin; (3) the mechanisms and discharge characteristics of outbursts; and (4) case histories of floods, illustrating potential hazards.

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A History of Jökulhlaups from Strandline Lake, Alaska, U.S.A.

Cited by 24 publications

References 9 publications

Surficial geologic map of the Anchorage B-7 SE quadrangle, Alaska

Surficial geologic map of the Anchorage B-7 SE quadrangle, Alaska

Origin of the outburst flood from Glacier de Tête Rousse in 1892 (Mont Blanc area, France)

Jökulhlaups in Iceland: sources, release and drainage

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