| Show scientific expedition discovers worlds largest non polar icecap stretches over miles in alaska and yukon expedition says washington D C discovery of what is believed to be the worlds largest ice field and glacial group outside the polar regions has been announced in dispatches from bradford washburn leader of the harvard university national geographic society expedition to alaska heads of the martin river and miles glaciers are also connected to the long icecap reaching from cape st elias in alaska to the albek river valley in yukon discovered on our flight of august 20 mr washburn wired to the socie tys headquarters on a spectacular flight which circled mount logan and mount st elias second and third highest peaks on od the north american continent the expedition made aerial photographs of an unexplored area of southeastern alaska to be used later in mapping the report to the society continues this flight over icebound fast nesses previously unvisited by man reveals that the bering glacier and the malaspina glacier whose known extent had already won for them the titles of the worlds largest rivers of ice are merely two overflows from a vast highland ice field shrouding a stretch of alaska about miles long equal to the distance from new york city to washington D C long lain unseen explorations of the harvard uni hersity national geographic society expedition have outlined a coast range of mountains stretching from the copper river valley above cordova alaska to the albek river valley in canadas yukon which walls in a mighty reservoir of ice completely hidden behind the mountain wall the mammoth octopus of ice has lain unseen and unapproachable its size to be guessed only from the tentacles of glaciers it has clamped around the coastal range largest of the numerous streams of ice overflowing from this giant ice bowl cupped high among peaks two and three miles above sea level are the bering and malaspina glaciers SO 30 and 50 miles wide after they have broken through the mountain wall and ground their way down almost to the sea in a single flight of discovery over alanskas newly revealed ice giant the expedition saw more ice than is known in all the famous glaciers of europe put together summing up Wash burns reports and commenting on their significance a bulletin from the national geographic society says photographing 1500 square miles of territory the expedition found 1 I 1 new ridges in the coast mountain range 2 new glaciers between the range and the chitina chilina river 50 miles farther inland to the north and 3 a glacier system uniting the bering and malaspina giants with the seward glacier in the southeast and with the miles glacier in the northwest difficulties encountered most of the newly discovered ice bowl lies athwart and to the west of the alaska canada boundary line just where it turns due north to the arctic ocean in surveying this frontier famous as one of the longest straight line borders ever marked some of the difficulties in running the line along the meridian were due to the eastward overflow of glaciers from the then unknown ice field the massive glacier bowl pours its slow and irresistible flood across the border birder southeastward between mount logan and mount st elias into the seward glacier which in turn adds its congealed volume to the great malaspina the great glacier system explains PI ains why there is no land communication muni cation between the southern panhandle of alaska containing the capital and the major portion of the territory to the north the land link is broken by a glacier barrier of more than miles of perpetual ice the malaspina glacier is so extensive that it was not recognized as a glacier until 1880 rocks and soil cover the ice around the edges and forests take root in the ice borne earth it is a composite ice e stream formed by about a dozen coalescing glaciers the largest of which is the seward when the new glacier system is mapped there is little doubt that alaska will be confirmed as the worlds largest stronghold of the ice age outside the polar regions |
