Columbia Glacier

Columbia Glacier is a tidewater glacier in Prince William Sound on Alaska’s south coast, descending through the western Chugach Mountains from the saddle between Mount Witherspoon and Mount Einstein to the sea. Named in 1899 by the Harriman Alaska Expedition for Columbia University, it is also known as one of the world’s fastest-moving glaciers. Since the early 1980s, it has retreated rapidly and become a closely watched example of a shrinking Alaskan tidewater glacier. In one area it has thinned by about 1,300 feet, and since 1982 its terminus has withdrawn about 16 kilometers, making it an important benchmark for studying ice loss and glacier dynamics.

Valdez, Alaska · United States