An ice field (also spelled icefield ) is a mass of interconnected valley glaciers (also called mountain glaciers or alpine glaciers) on a mountain mass with protruding rock ridges or summits. They are often found in the colder climates and higher altitudes of the world where there is sufficient precipitation for them to form. The higher peaks of the underlying mountain rock that protrude through the icefields are known as nunataks . Ice fields are larger than alpine glaciers, but smaller than ice caps and ice sheets . The topography of ice fields is determined by the shape of the surrounding landforms, while ice caps have their own forms overriding underlying shapes.
16-585: The Chaba Icefield is an ice field located at the southern end of Hamber Provincial Park , extending into Jasper National Park and straddles the Continental Divide marking the Alberta - British Columbia border. This article about a glacier is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Ice field Ice fields are formed by a large accumulation of snow which, through years of compression and freezing, turns into ice. Because of
32-692: A rate of 50 millimetres (2 in) per year with respect to North America. The Yakutat plate is transported northwards along the active Fairweather Fault , which probably started more than 35 million years ago. Due to its thickness, the Yakutat plate is buoyant, resulting in surface uplift of the overriding North American plate, which formed the Talkeetna Mountains and the Alaska Range in Southcentral Alaska , located above
48-916: Is also distinguishable from an ice cap because it does not have a dome-like form. There are several ice fields in the Himalayas and Altay Mountains (the border range between the Central Asian Republics and China ). One unexpected ice field is located in Yolyn Am , a mountain valley located in the northern end of the Gobi Desert . There are no ice fields in Australia . New Zealand has Reference: The only large ice fields in mainland Europe are in Norway (e.g., Dovre and Jotunheimen ). There are several dozen small ice fields in
64-469: Is the world's second largest contiguous extrapolar ice field. At about 16,800 square kilometers, it is second only to southeastern Alaska's approximately 25,000 square kilometer Kluane / Wrangell–St. Elias / Glacier Bay / Tatshenshini-Alsek Ice Field . Another notable icefield is Campo de Hielo Norte ( Northern Patagonian Ice Field ), which is located entirely in Chile ; and a third smaller icefield, known as
80-1037: The Alps and tiny remnants of permanent ice in Sweden , the Apennines , the Pyrenees and the Balkans . Since the disappearance of the last remaining ice field in Andalucía , with the disappearance of the Corral del Veleta glacier in 1913, the southernmost surviving permanent ice field in continental Europe is Snezhnika in Bulgaria . Beyond the mainland of continental Europe, there are substantial ice fields in Iceland , Svalbard and Franz-Josef Land and smaller surviving ice fields on Jan Mayen and Novaya Zemlya . One of
96-789: The Coast Mountains , Alaska Range , and Chugach Mountains of Alaska , British Columbia , and the Yukon Territory . The 6,500 km Stikine Icecap (located between the Stikine and Taku Rivers ) and the 2,500 km Juneau Icefield (located between Lynn Canal and the Taku River ) both straddle the British Columbian-Alaskan border. Farther north, the Kluane Icecap — which feeds
112-679: The Sargent Icefield and the Harding Icefield . Throughout the Alaska Range there also large icefields (including one surrounding Denali ) which are mostly unnamed. In South America there are three main ice fields. The main ice field, known as Campo de Hielo Sur ( Southern Patagonian Ice Field ) is located at the Southern Patagonic Andes , and it is shared between Chile and Argentina . It
128-516: The syntaxis region the tectonic style changes from strike-slip motion along the Fairweather Fault to collision west of Malaspina Strait . This tectonic transition concentrates stress in the crust at the syntaxis that together with efficient glacial erosion results in positive feedback processes that through time forms extreme high mountain peaks and local relief, and rapid exhumation of rocks from up to 10 km (6.2 mi) depths to
144-780: The Ice Fields of the Darwin Range, which is located on the western ( Chilean ) portion of Tierra del Fuego proper . Saint Elias Mountains The Saint Elias Mountains ( French : Chaîne Saint-Élie ) are a subgroup of the Pacific Coast Ranges , located in southeastern Alaska in the United States , Southwestern Yukon and the very far northwestern part of British Columbia in Canada . The range spans Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve in
160-733: The United States and Kluane National Park and Reserve in Canada and includes all of Glacier Bay National Park in Alaska . In Alaska, the range includes parts of the city/borough of Yakutat and the Hoonah-Angoon and Valdez-Cordova census areas. This mountain range is named after Mount Saint Elias , which in turn was named in 1741 by the Danish-born Russian explorer Vitus Bering . The Saint Elias Mountains form
176-713: The drainage divide ( Bagley Icefield , Seward Glacier ) and north of it are composed of rocks that are part of the North American plate. The highest peaks of the St. Elias Mountains are located in the high ice field region of the Kluane National Park ( Mount Logan , Mount Vancouver ) and north of the Malaspina Glacier ( Mount Saint Elias , Mount Cook ), in the region known as the St. Elias syntaxis . At
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#1732798770622192-535: The highest coastal mountain range on Earth. It formed due to the subduction of the Yakutat microplate underneath the North American Plate . The Yakutat microplate is a wedge shaped oceanic plateau with a thickness of 20 to 30 kilometres (12 to 19 mi). Similar to the adjacent Pacific Plate , which has a crustal thickness of 7 kilometres (4.3 mi), the Yakutat plate is moving northwestward at
208-757: The immense Malaspina and Hubbard Glaciers as well as the Bagley Icefield — sits upon the British Columbia-Yukon Territory-Alaska border and surrounds most of the Saint Elias Mountains as well as both Mount Saint Elias and Mount Logan ; it extends as far west as the Copper River . There are also large ice fields located in the Kenai Peninsula - Chugach Mountains area, such as
224-614: The more celebrated North American ice fields is the Columbia Icefield located in the Rocky Mountains between Jasper and Banff , Alberta . Easy access by road contributes to the status of this ice field as one of the most visited in North America, although it is actually a comparatively small ice field within the huge and largely ice-free American Cordillera . Many particularly expansive ice fields lie in
240-426: The subducted part of the Yakutat plate. The Saint Elias Mountains formed at the plate boundary between the Yakutat and North American plates. The up-to-12-kilometre (7.5 mi)-thick sediments that have been deposited on top of the Yakutat plate became imbricated and deformed as they were scraped off and compose today the southern (coastal) flanks of the St. Elias Mountains. In contrast the high elevated regions of
256-434: The susceptibility of ice to gravity, ice fields usually form over large areas that are basins or atop plateaus, thus allowing a continuum of ice to form over the landscape uninterrupted by glacial channels. Glaciers often form on the edges of ice fields, serving as gravity-propelled drains off the ice field which is in turn replenished by snowfall. While an ice cap is not constrained by topography, an ice field is. An ice field
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