ice jam
Americannoun
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an obstruction of broken river ice in a narrow part of a channel.
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a mass of lake or sea ice broken and piled up against the shore by wind pressure.
Etymology
Origin of ice jam
First recorded in 1840–50
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
It’s difficult to predict when the ice jam could break, said Crane Johnson, a hydrologist with the weather service’s Alaska-Pacific River Forecast Center.
From Seattle Times ● May 13, 2021
In Newaygo County, Mich., where a 21-mile ice jam on the Muskegon River had flooded yards and closed a bridge, the warm-up was welcome.
From New York Times ● Feb. 1, 2019
Watch drone footage of the Susquehanna River ice jam:
From Washington Post ● Jan. 17, 2018
And that’s setting the stage for some pretty cool phenomena — like this ice jam on the Ausable River in Au Sable Forks, located in upstate New York.
From The Verge ● Jan. 12, 2018
The great ice jam had parted from Rolfe's Island and was swinging out into the open, pushing everything before it.
From Homespun Tales by Kate Douglas Smith Wiggin
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
