Kennicott Glacier

I spent a fair amount of time in McCarthy in the past few years, but never did any work on the glacier that is right outside the town: the Kennicott Glacier. The lower part of the glacier is almost entirely covered in debris of various thickness. This debris does protect the glacier ice from melting, but how exactly melt works on dirty glaciers is still an open question. My post-doc Pascal Buri proposed to put a comprehensive weather station on the middle of the glacier, so Andy Aschwanden, Pascal, and I headed down to carry gear and install the equipment.

Navigating across the rough glacier surface

The abandoned copper mining town of Kennecott

Here it is: the weather station

A beautiful rock glacier above the town of Kennecott

North side of the Alaska Range on the way home

A debris slump