“Alaskan Eagle Taking Flight”
Photo of the Week #11, selected in July, 2019
During our Alaska cruise a couple of years ago, it was difficult to get as many striking photos as I’d hoped, the region having been inundated with smoke from vast forest fires burning in Northern Canada. I was able to take a few excellent shots, however, and this bald eagle was the star of our glacier stop. This wondrous living symbol of America, which had been sitting on a chunk of ice floating in Glacier Bay, posed for several minutes as we approached, then took flight, fortunately while I was targeting it with my telephoto lens. The water in the bay was a dull blue due to the silt deposited by the glaciers.
Glacier Bay is the product of the Little Ice Age, a geologically recent glacial advance in northern regions. The Little Ice Age reached its maximum extent around 1750. Since then, the massive glacier that filled the bay has retreated 65 miles to the heads of its inlets. With global climate change, the retreat has accelerated and it is perhaps in the process of disappearing completely, at least until the next Ice Age.
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