The Passchendaele Ice Fall is a glacial ice feature in the Ōtākou / Otago region of the Te Waipounamu / South Island of Aotearoa New Zealand.
It has a latitude of -44.455042 and a longitude of 168.403498 and it’s status is: Official Assigned.
Situated between Passchendaele Peak and Mount Destiny, this glacier is named after one of the First World War’s bloodiest confrontations. Fought between July and November 1917, the Passchendaele Campaign around the Belgian city of Ypres has come to symbolise the dreadful conditions that soldiers faced.
In heavy rains that reduced the ground to mud, both sides carried out a series of offensives where gains were usually measured in yards rather than miles. British Field Marshal Sir Douglas Haig has been criticised by many historians for continuing the battle even after all hope of a breakthrough had passed.
Total Allied casualties numbered between 200,000 and 400,000; with the German forces sustaining similar loses. Passchendaele proved particularly costly for the New Zealand Division, which suffered more than 18,000 casualties. Although it did carry out some successful actions, such as the capture of Gravenstafel Spur, the Division also endured the bloodiest day in New Zealand’s military history.
On 12 October 1917, at Bellevue Spur, 845 of its men were killed and over 2,700 wounded in an attack lasting only a few hours.
The name Passchendaele Ice Fall was first assigned by the Honorary Geographic Board of New Zealand in 1938, and was officially confirmed by the New Zealand Geographic Board in 1948.
It’s geographical description is noted as: Icefall between Mount Passchendaele and Destiny Peak, falls into the Joe River Valley, north of Barrier Range. Feature shown on: NZTopo50-CA10 335679.