The construction of the Copper River and Northwestern Railway from Cordova through the upper river valley from 1908 to 1911 allowed widespread extraction of the mineral resources, in particular from the Kennecott Mine, discovered in 1898. Extraction of the copper resources was problematic due to navigation difficulties at the river's mouth. The name of the river comes from the abundant copper deposits along the upper river that were used by Alaska Native population and then later by settlers from the Russian Empire and the United States. The Copper enters the Gulf of Alaska southeast of Cordova where it creates a delta nearly 50 miles (80 km) wide. Both Miles Glacier and Childs Glacier calve directly into the river. There is an extensive area of linear sand dunes up to 250 feet (76 m) in height radiating from the mouth of the Copper River. ĭownstream from its confluence with the Chitina it flows southwest, passing through a narrow glacier-lined gap in the Chugach Mountains within the Chugach National Forest east of Cordova Peak. The river runs at an average of 7 miles per hour (11 km/h).
It drops an average of about 12 feet per mile (2.3 m/km), and drains more than 24,000 square miles (62,000 km 2)-an area the size of West Virginia. The Copper River is approximately 290 miles (470 km) long. A man dip netting on the Copper River, undated photo by John Nathan Cobb (died 1930)
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