Tigertail Glacier starts in the Sargent Icefield on the Kenai Peninsula and flows northeast for 4 miles (6.5 km) to Nassau Fjord, about 36 miles (58 km) east-northeast of Seward and 36 miles (58 km) south-southeast of Whittier, Alaska. The glacier was named in 1909 by George W. Perkins of the U.S. Geological Survey and refers to the larger Tiger Glacier about 3 miles (4.8 km) to the south.

Dangerous Passage is a glacially eroded fjord separating Chenega Island from the Kenai Peninsula and has a series of smaller elongate tributary fjords, including Icy Bay, Whale Bay, Jackpot Bay, and Nassau Fjord. Nassau Fjord is about 4 miles (6.5 km) long and includes the tidewater Chenega Glacier, and the Princeton and Tigertail Glaciers that terminate within 1 mile (1.6 km) of tidewater.

During the most recent major ice advance in southern Alaska, about 10,000 years before the present, many of the glacier ice margins advanced to their maximum extent. A minor advance began in about the year 1300 when the Princeton Glacier merged with Chenega and Tigertail glaciers and advanced to the mouth of Nassau Bay, before retreating to the fjord head in the late 1800s. There is evidence that between 1898 and 1908 the Chenega Glacier retreated over 2 miles (3.2 km) which opened up Nassau Fjord, and the glaciers separated into individual ice streams. Since 1908, Tigertail Glacier has reduced in volume and retreated from tidewater. Read more here and here. Explore more of Tigertail Glacier and Nassau Fjord here: