Glacier Blanc

The Glacier Blanc is a glacier in the French département of Hautes-Alpes. Its name (which means "white glacier") derives from the fact that – unlike the nearby Glacier Noir ("black glacier") – its surface appears pristinely white due to an absence of morainic debris.

A glacier that is largely free of such moraines is generally described in French as a glacier blanc.

The Glacier Blanc begins on the northern slopes of the most southwesterly of the four-thousanders in the Alps, the 4,102 m high Barre des Écrins. It is separated from the Glacier Noir to the south by the crest of Crête de l'Encoula (or Crête de l'Encula), that runs from the Barre des Écrins to the Pointe du Serre Subeyran. The upper part of the glacier is sometimes named Glacier de l'Enc(o)ula after this arête; on several older maps this name is used for the whole glacier.

With its 5.9 km-long tongue (in 2002), the Glacier Blanc is the longest glacier in the Massif des Écrins and the largest in the southern French Alps. Its area of 5.34 km² (2002) is not, however, as great as that of the Glacier de la Girose and the Glacier du Mont-de-Lans, which form a common system. The Glacier Blanc is a typical valley glacier, which initially runs in a curve towards the northeast below the Barre, before its tongue turns southeast, becoming an icefall. Its average incline is about 30%, but it is flatter in its central section than on the north slope of the Barre des Écrins or in the icefall of its lower section.

The glacier is bounded on its orographically left-hand side by, inter alia, the summits of the Roche Faurio (3,730 m), Pic de Neige Cordier (3,614 m) and the Montagne des Agneaux (3,664 m). The Crête de l'Encoula forms the southern boundary, running from the Barre des Écrins over Barre Noir (3,661 m), Pointe Mettrier (3,664 m) and Pointe de la Grande Sagne (3,660 m) to the Pointe du Serre Subeyran (3,472 m). Between the peaks that surround the glacial basin are smaller side glaciers that feed the main stream.

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Wikipedia