Beautiful Mount Rainier
by Jeff Swan
Title
Beautiful Mount Rainier
Artist
Jeff Swan
Medium
Photograph - Photography
Description
Mount Rainier (pronounced: /reɪˈnɪər/), Mount Tacoma, or Mount Tahoma is the highest mountain of the Cascade Range of the Pacific Northwest, and the highest mountain in the U.S. state of Washington. It is a large active stratovolcano located 54 miles (87 km) south-southeast of Seattle, in the Mount Rainier National Park. It is the most topographically prominent mountain in the contiguous United States and the Cascade Volcanic Arc, with a summit elevation of 14,411 ft (4,392 m).[4][5]
Mt. Rainier is considered one of the most dangerous volcanoes in the world, and it is on the Decade Volcano list.[6] Because of its large amount of glacial ice, Mt. Rainier could produce massive lahars that could threaten the entire Puyallup River valley, and poses a grave threat to the southern sections of the Seattle metropolitan area, a city of over 650,000 people with more than 3.7 million living in its metropolitan area.[7]
Contents [hide]
1 Name
2 Geographical setting
2.1 Subsidiary peaks
3 Geology
3.1 Modern activity and the current threat
3.2 Seismic background
3.3 Glaciers
4 Human history
5 Climbing and recreation
6 Climate
7 See also
8 References
9 External links
Name[edit]
Mount Rainier was first known by the Native Americans as Talol, or Tacoma or Tahoma. One hypothesis of the word origin is [təqʷ�ʔbəʔ] ("mother of waters"), in the Lushootseed language spoken by the Puyallup people.[8] Another hypothesis is that "Tacoma" means "larger than Mount Baker" in Lushootseed: "Ta", larger, plus "Koma (Kulshan)", Mount Baker.[9] Other names originally used include Tahoma, Tacobeh, and Pooskaus.[10]
The current name was given by George Vancouver, who named it in honor of his friend, Rear Admiral Peter Rainier.[11] The map of the Lewis and Clark expedition of 1804-1806 refers to it as "Mt. Regniere".
Although "Rainier" had been considered the official name of the mountain, Theodore Winthrop, in his posthumously published 1862 travel book The Canoe and the Saddle, referred to the mountain as "Tacoma" and for a time, both names were used interchangeably, although "Mt. Tacoma" was preferred in the city of Tacoma.[12][13]
In 1890, the United States Board on Geographic Names declared that the mountain would be known as "Rainier".[14] Following this in 1897, the Pacific Forest Reserve became the Mount Rainier Forest Reserve, and the national park was established three years later. Despite this, there was still a movement to change the mountain's name to "Tacoma" and Congress was still considering a resolution to change the name as late as 1924.[15][16]
In the lead up to Super Bowl XLVIII, the Washington State Senate passed a resolution on Friday, January 31, 2014, temporarily renaming the mountain Mount Seattle Seahawks until the midnight after the Super Bowl, Monday, February 3, 2014,[17] in response to the renaming of 53 mountains in Colorado after the 53 members of the Denver Broncos by Governor of Colorado John Hickenlooper.[18]
After the 2015 restoration of the original name of Denali to Mount McKinley in Alaska, debate over Mount Rainier's name intensified.[19]
Geographical setting[edit]
Mount Rainier is the highest mountain in Washington and the Cascade Range. This peak is located just east of Eatonville and just southeast of Seattle and Tacoma.[20] Mount Rainier is ranked third of the 128 ultra-prominent mountain peaks of the United States. Mount Rainier has a topographic prominence of 13,210 ft (4,026 m), which is greater than that of K2, the world's second-tallest mountain, at 13,189 ft (4,020 m).[21] On clear days it dominates the southeastern horizon in most of the Seattle-Tacoma metropolitan area to such an extent that locals sometimes refer to it simply as "the Mountain."[22] On days of exceptional clarity, it can also be seen from as far away as Corvallis, Oregon (at Marys Peak) and Victoria, British Columbia.[23]
With 26 major glaciers[24] and 36 sq mi (93 km2) of permanent snowfields and glaciers,[25] Mount Rainier is the most heavily glaciated peak in the lower 48 states. The summit is topped by two volcanic craters, each more than 1,000 ft (300 m) in diameter, with the larger east crater overlapping the west crater. Geothermal heat from the volcano keeps areas of both crater rims free of snow and ice, and has formed the world's largest volcanic glacier cave network within the ice-filled craters,[26] with nearly 2 mi (3.2 km) of passages.[27] A small crater lake about 130 by 30 ft (39.6 by 9.1 m) in size and 16 ft (5 m) deep, the highest in North America with a surface elevation of 14,203 ft (4,329 m), occupies the lowest portion of the west crater below more than 100 ft (30 m) of ice and is accessible only via the caves.[28][29]
The Carbon, Puyallup, Mowich, Nisqually, and Cowlitz Rivers begin at eponymous glaciers of Mount Rainier. The sources of the White River are Winthrop, Emmons, and Fryingpan Glaciers. The White, Carbon, and Mowich join the Puyallup River, which discharges into Commencement Bay at Tacoma; the Nisqually empties into Puget Sound east of Lacey; and the Cowlitz joins the Columbia River between Kelso and Longview.
A panorama of the south face of Mount Rainier viewed from Westside Road, Washington State Route 706
Subsidiary peaks[edit]
The broad top of Mount Rainier contains three named summits. The highest is called the Columbia Crest. The second highest summit is Point Success, 14,158 ft (4,315 m), at the southern edge of the summit plateau, atop the ridge known as Success Cleaver. It has a topographic prominence of about 138 ft (42 m), so it is not considered a separate peak. The lowest of the three summits is Liberty Cap, 14,112 ft (4,301 m), at the northwestern edge, which overlooks Liberty Ridge, the Sunset Amphitheater, and the dramatic Willis Wall. Liberty Cap has a prominence of 492 ft (150 m), and so would qualify as a separate peak under most strictly prominence-based rules. A prominence cutoff of 400 ft (122 m) is commonly used in Washington state.[30]
High on the eastern flank of Mount Rainier is a peak known as Little Tahoma Peak, 11,138 ft (3,395 m), an eroded remnant of the earlier, much higher, Mount Rainier. It has a prominence of 858 ft (262 m), and it is almost never climbed in direct conjunction with Columbia Crest, so it is usually considered a separate peak. If considered separately from Mt. Rainier, Little Tahoma Peak would be the third highest mountain peak in Washington.[31][32]
Geology[edit]
Hazard map
Mount Rainier is a stratovolcano in the Cascade Volcanic Arc that consists of lava flows, debris flows, and pyroclastic ejecta and flows. Its early volcanic deposits are estimated at more than 840,000 years old and are part of the Lily Formation (about 2.9 million to 840,000 years ago). The early deposits formed a "proto-Rainier" or an ancestral cone prior to the present-day cone.[33] The present cone is more than 500,000 years old.[34]
The volcano is highly eroded, with glaciers on its slopes, and appears to be made mostly of andesite. Rainier likely once stood even higher than today at about 16,000 ft (4,900 m) before a major debris avalanche and the resulting Osceola Mudflow approximately 5,000 years ago.[35] In the past, Rainier has had large debris avalanches, and has also produced enormous lahars (volcanic mudflows) due to the large amount of glacial ice present. Its lahars have reached all the way to Puget Sound, a distance of more than 30 mi (48 km). Around 5,000 years ago, a large chunk of the volcano slid away and that debris avalanche helped to produce the massive Osceola Mudflow, which went all the way to the site of present-day Tacoma and south Seattle.[36] This massive avalanche of rock and ice removed the top 1,600 ft (500 m) of Rainier, bringing its height down to around 14,100 ft (4,300 m). About 530 to 550 years ago, the Electron Mudflow occurred, although this was not as large-scale as the Osceola Mudflow.[37]
After the major collapse approximately 5,000 years ago, subsequent eruptions of lava and tephra built up the modern summit cone until about as recently as 1,000 years ago. As many as 11 Holocene tephra layers have been found.[33]
Modern activity and the current threat[edit]
Decade Volcanoes TeideTeide NyiragongoNyiragongo VesuviusVesuvius EtnaEtna SantoriniSantorini UnzenUnzen SakurajimaSakurajima TaalTaal MerapiMerapi UlawunUlawun Mauna LoaMauna Loa ColimaColima Santa Mar�aSanta Mar�a AvachinskyAvachinsky KoryakskyKoryaksky GalerasGaleras RainierRainier
Mount Rainier is one of the 16 Decade Volcanoes.
The most recent recorded volcanic eruption was between 1820 and 1854, but many eyewitnesses reported eruptive activity in 1858, 1870, 1879, 1882 and 1894 as well.[38]
Although Mount Rainier is an active volcano, as of 2016 seismic monitors within Mount Rainier National Park and on top of the mountain appear to show that it is indeed very much alive, but very soundly asleep.[39] However, an eruption could be deadly for all living in areas within the immediate vicinity of the volcano and an eruption would also cause trouble from Vancouver, Canada to San Francisco[40] because of the massive amounts of ash blasting out of the volcano into the atmosphere.
Mount Rainier is located in an area that itself is part of the eastern rim of the Pacific Ring of Fire. This includes mountains and calderas like Mount Shasta and Lassen Peak in California, Crater Lake, Three Sisters, and Mount Hood in Oregon, Mount Saint Helens, Mount Adams, Glacier Peak, and Mount Baker in Washington, and Mount Cayley, Garibaldi, Silverthrone, and Mount Meager in British Columbia. All of the above are dormant, but alive, and scientists on both sides of the border gather research of the past eruptions of each in order to predict how mountains in this arc will behave and what they are capable of in the future, including Mount Rainier.[41][42] Of these, only two have erupted since the beginning of the twentieth century: Lassen in 1915 and St. Helens in 1980 and 2004. However, past eruptions in this volcanic arc have multiple examples of sub-plinian eruptions or higher: Crater Lake's last eruption as Mount Mazama was large enough to cause its cone to implode,[43] and Mt. Rainier's closest neighbor, Mount St. Helens' had a huge chunk of the side of the mountain blow up in a phreatic explosion caused by a mix of gas and water; where St. Helens was once perfectly symmetrical there is now, thirty five years later, a huge crater at the top of one face. Statistics place the likelihood of a major eruption in this range at 2-3 per century.[44]
Mount Rainier is currently listed as a Decade Volcano, or one of the 16 volcanoes with the greatest likelihood of causing great loss of life and property if eruptive activity resumes.[45] If Mt. Rainier were to erupt as powerfully as Mount St. Helens did in its May 18, 1980 eruption, the effect would be cumulatively greater, because of the far more massive amounts of glacial ice locked on the volcano compared to Mount St. Helens,[37] the vastly more heavily populated areas surrounding Rainier, and the simple fact that Mt Rainier is a much bigger volcano, almost twice the size of St. Helens.[46] Lahars from Rainier pose the most risk to life and property,[47] as many communities lie atop older lahar deposits. According to the United States Geological Survey (USGS), about 150,000 people live on top of old lahar deposits of Rainier.[7] Not only is there much ice atop the volcano, the volcano is also slowly being weakened by hydrothermal activity. According to Geoff Clayton, a geologist with a Washington State Geology firm, RH2 Engineering, a repeat of the Osceola mudflow would destroy Enumclaw, Orting, Kent, Auburn, Puyallup, Sumner and all of Renton.[36] Such a mudflow might also reach down the Duwamish estuary and destroy parts of downtown Seattle, and cause tsunamis in Puget Sound and Lake Washington.[48] Rainier is also capable of producing pyroclastic flows and expelling lava.[48
Uploaded
January 10th, 2017
Statistics
Viewed 742 Times - Last Visitor from Ottawa, ON - Canada on 04/25/2024 at 5:15 AM
Embed
Share
Sales Sheet