Kluane Lake
Kluane Lake is in the southwest Yukon and is the largest lake entirely in Yukon. It covers about 408 square kilometers (158 square miles) and is about 81 kilometers (50 miles) long. The lake sits around 781 meters (2,562 feet) above sea level. It lies near Haines Junction, and the Alaska Highway runs along its south shore, offering lake views.
The lake sits on land connected to the Kluane First Nation and White River First Nation, with Champagne and Aishihik First Nations nearby.
Until 2016, Kluane Lake was fed mainly by the Slims River, which carried meltwater from the Kaskawulsh Glacier in Kluane National Park and Reserve. The lake drains into the Kluane River, which flows to the Donjek River, then the White River, the Yukon River, and finally reaches the Bering Sea.
Kluane Lake has many large lake trout and whitefish, but fishing has declined in recent years.
In May 2016, a climate-change–driven event drastically altered the lake. The Slims River stopped delivering water because meltwater found a new path through the region to the Gulf of Alaska. The Kaskawulsh Glacier began sending water into the Kaskawulsh River, then the Alsek, and finally the Gulf of Alaska. This diverted flow away from Kluane Lake, which could become an isolated basin as inflow decreases. The change also affects the lake’s water chemistry and fish, and dust clouds sometimes fill the air.
From 1956 to 2007, the Kaskawuluh Glacier retreated about 655 meters (2,149 feet), an amount many scientists link to human-caused climate change. The new channel formed in 2016 carved through a large ice field to the Alsek River and the Gulf of Alaska.
Two Yukon communities sit on the lake’s western shore: Burwash Landing and Destruction Bay. Nearby caribou migrate around Kluane and Aishihik Lakes. In 2009, there were about 181 caribou in the Kluane herd (Burwash) and about 2,044 in the Aishihik herd. The Kluane herd was shrinking while the Aishihik herd was growing.
This page was last edited on 2 February 2026, at 23:29 (CET).