The National Science Foundation has granted a team of researchers, including scientists from Juneau, nearly $1 million to study glacial outburst floods linked to Juneau’s Mendenhall Glacier.
A glacial outburst flood happens when a lake created by a glacier suddenly releases water into a river. For the past two years, such floods have caused serious damage in Juneau, particularly from a lake known as Suicide Basin, which sits beside Mendenhall Glacier.
Professor Jason Amundson from the University of Alaska Southeast will lead the study focusing on the basin’s shape, the glacier itself, and how water flows into Mendenhall Lake. He believes this research will help hydrologists better understand the timing and volume of water moving through Mendenhall River and into nearby neighborhoods.
“The conditions can vary a lot from year to year, making it challenging to observe what’s happening in the basin,” Amundson explained.
Studying how the basin changes over time may reveal insights into how much water could be released and how quickly each year.
However, the research will take time. It won’t immediately clarify what to expect from this year’s glacial outburst flood.
Eran Hood, another UAS researcher, has been investigating the Suicide Basin and its flooding patterns for years. He noted that funding for Mendenhall flood research has been limited because previous events were not considered a major risk.
“For a long time, the floods hadn’t caused enough damage to raise alarms about funding for research,” Hood stated. “Now that they are impacting homes, there’s a pressing need for a larger team to explore this issue more thoroughly.”
The findings could play a significant role in shaping local policies. “People are discussing building levees or walls to manage flood risks. Any engineering plans will benefit from our research on potential flood volumes,” Hood added.
Additionally, Hood emphasized that current data could help predict whether other glacier-adjacent communities might face similar flooding in the future. “If we had the modeling capabilities 30 years ago that we have now, we could have identified Suicide Basin as a potential flood risk area,” he said. “Sadly, that kind of foresight didn’t exist.”
This five-year grant will deepen the understanding of how Suicide Basin forms, how it might change, and what signs could indicate flooding risks in other regions. The research team includes experts from the University of Alaska Fairbanks and Carnegie Mellon University. They also plan to involve graduate and undergraduate students in their work.
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Carnegie Mellon University,climate change,Eran Hood,Glacial outburst flooding,Jason Amundson,Mendenhall Glacier,natural disaster,Suicide Basin,University of Alaska Fairbanks,University of Alaska Southeast
