Glacial Processes and Features

Front

Corrie

Back

Armchair-shaped hollow in the mountainside formed by glacial erosion, rotational slip, and freeze-thaw weathering.

Front

Crevasse

Back

Deep cracks in glaciers.

Front

Drumlin

Back

Smooth, egg-shaped hills formed from glacial till deposited by a moving glacier. The end facing the glacier often has a steeper slope.

Front

Erratic

Back

Very large boulders carried by a glacier. When ice melts, the boulders drop, formed from different rock than the bedrock they were deposited on.

Front

Fjord

Back

A flooded, glaciated valley found where glaciation occurred below sea level, forming a narrow steep-sided inlet connected to the sea.

Front

Glacial till

Back

Unsorted glacial sediment.

Front

Hanging valley

Back

A tributary valley to the main glacier, too cold and high up for ice to move easily.

Front

Ice age

Back

A glacial episode characterized by lower than average global temperatures and extensive ice coverage.

Front

Ice cores

Back

Cylinders of ice pulled from ice sheets and glaciers, showing horizontal layers of ice formed over time.

Front

Interglacial

Back

A geological interval of warmer global average temperature lasting thousands of years.