disaster

Mt. Borah lifted by a quake

October 24, 2010

photos – July 25, 2010

Mount Rorah and the Lost River Range

Located in the central section of the Lost River Range, Borah Peak (aka Mt. Borah) is the highest mountain in Idaho.

On Friday, October 28, 1983, a magnitude 6.9 earthquake centered near the base of the mountain lifted Borah Peak about a foot, while the Lost River Valley floor dropped up to 7.5 feet in places. It also resulted in a 20-mile scarp along the base of the Lost River Range and sand boils near Chilly Butte and the Lost River and Pahsimeroi valleys. Two elementary school students were killed in Challis.

Mount Rorah and the Lost River Range

Mout Borah earthquake scarp

The scarp – highlighted in blue – resulting from the quake can still be seen 27 years later. The red line highlights a dirt “road.” The above image was cropped from the photo below.

Mout Borah earthquake scarp

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Dodged an icy bullet!

January 29, 2010

We’ve been watching this storm system move our way all week – and we’ve been getting ready for it.

Yesterday, the weather forecast was that we could get as a .75 inch coating of ice on trees and power lines – enough ice to be disastrous.

Fortunately, though, the ice here didn’t get more than a quarter of an inch. Fortunately, the freezing rain changed to sleet and, later, snow.

It was enough, though, that we didn’t venture out all day – no need. We’ve got about 4 inches of snow on top of the ice.

We were ready, though, just in case.

One of the first things I did was to move the motorhome between the house and the shop. The area where it is normally parked is next to and under several large pines. After our close call last year, when an ice storm dropped branches, power lines and even whole trees not too far north of us, we decided that we would move it to a safer location if another ice storm was forecast for our area.

We also made sure we had enough groceries, which we did.

Just in case we lost power like we did last year, I had topped off the fuel tank in the motorhome. I also moved our other smaller generator up to the front porch and made sure I found the cords for running power to the refrigerator, fireplace blower, computers and TV.

Despite the winter weather we’ve had this year, we haven’t lost power this season – yet!

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A Day in Rocky Mountain National Park

September 6, 2009

Young spike elk in West Horseshoe Park area

Still smoky

Gold mantled ground squirrel on Aluvial Fan Nature Trail

Karen and Mike at Hidden Valley

Controlled burn in the park

Elk in meadow (click for larger panorama view)

A smoky sunset

Rocky Mountain National Park — September 1, 2009

We decided to limit our first full day to lower elevations rather than heading directly to Trail Ridge Road, which runs up over 12,000 feet above sea level. We started out by going to the visitor centers on the park’s east side.

We got out of the camper fairly early and made it to the Fall River Visitor Center before it opened and saw more elk on the short drive over.

The Fall River Visitor Center is just outside the Fall River entrance station. We hadn’t planned to spend any time in Estes Park or do any shopping until later in the week, but, since the visitor center wasn’t open yet, we decided to check out an adjacent gift store.

The air in the area was still very smoky. I asked the rangers at the visitor center information counter about it and wasn’t terribly surprised when they told me that it was from the fires in California.

After leaving the Fall River Visitor Center we drove through Estes Park to the Beaver Meadows Visitor Center. It really isn’t much, as visitor centers go, even though it is at the entrance to the park that has the highest traffic. The park headquarters is also located at Beaver Meadows.

The next visitor center that we stopped at was at Moraine Meadows, in the same area as the campground. As we were going to an exhibit area on the upper floor, one of the volunteer nature interpreters was announcing a guided walk on the nature trail at the center. It was interesting and we learned a few things.

For example, have you ever got a good whiff of a Ponderosa Pine? Get up close to one and take a smell in one of the cracks in the tree’s bark. I was surprised to find that it a very pleasant odor, reminiscent of vanilla.

Our next stop was the Alluvial Fan.

In July, 1982, the old Lawn Lake dam failed and sent a torrent of water down Roaring River to Fall River. Along the way, it swept anything in it’s path away, including trees and huge rocks and boulders. It left behind an alluvial fan where the steep river mountain valley met the meadow of Horseshoe Park. Several people died and Estes Park streets were flooded with 6 feet of water.

We’ve visited the Alluvial Fan Nature Trail several times over the years and it’s interesting to see how nature is healing, albeit slowly, the scars of a man-made disaster.

Other places we visited included Beaver Ponds boardwalk, where a short boardwalk takes the visitor into meadows that are slowly being formed as silt is deposited in old beaver ponds, and Hidden Valley, which is one of several commercial ventures that have been returned to a natural state.

For many years, Hidden Valley was a ski area. The ski lift was closed in 1992 and removed within 10 years. Restoration of the area to near natural condition continues.

In the evening, we walked from the campground down to the meadow to see if we could see any elk. There was a large number, spread out over the meadow in the area just below the campground.

This post is being simultaneously published on Exit78 and Haw Creek Out ‘n About.

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Dust storm

August 29, 2009

4a-8e03000u
April, 1935
Prowers County, Colorado.

Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division

http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/fsa.8e03000

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Emergency Surface!

August 1, 2009

francis scott key emergency surface-photo from 633

The photo of an emergency surface exercise of the USS Francis Scott Key was taken from the USS Casimir Pulaski at some point after I served on the Pulaski.

While I was on the Pulaski, in late 1974 or early 1975, we performed an emergency surface exercise. I was fortunate enough to be on one of the controls, the fairwater planes.

For some reason, we had more machinest mates than needed for the watchbill. When divisions on board ship had a surplus of junior enlisted sailors, often they would be assigned to the mess decks. However, because I was in the nuclear power program, I was a petty officer before I reported to the boat and petty officers are NOT generally assigned food services duty. Instead, I qualified and stood watch as helmsman, planesman, and, when we were on the surface, lookout.

When we did the emergency surface, I remember being told to keep the angle of the ship from exceeding a certain value. I don’t remember the number, but I do remember, as the angle started rising, pushing forward on the yoke as far as possible and the angle just kept getting steeper. We were moving forward at “ahead full,” if I remember right, and were somewhere between 400 to 700 feet deep when the forward ballast tanks were blown to establish the upward angle. Not too long after that, the rest of the ballast tanks were blown. I don’t remember watching the depth indication, but it would have been changing faster than I had ever seen it change. There was likely a shuddering of the hull as it moved through the water and started to rise, as well as the souds of the water being blown from the tanks with air. Those who were standing would appear to be leaning forward when, in reality, they would be standing straight up as the deck took a steeper and steeper angle. I was seated, looking forward, so really didn’t see any of the crew who were standing.

When the boat broached the surface, it felt a bit like an amusement ride where you’ve been going up and up and up and then all of a sudden levels and drops. After emergency surfacing , the submarine came further out of the water than it would on a normal surface and, because of that, actually went below the surface until its positive buoyancy brought it back up.

Quite a memorable experience.

The video below shows another submarine doing an emergency surface.

An emergency surface exercise is supposed to be a controlled training evolution. As an exercise, it should never be done when there is the slightest possibility of other ships in the immediate area.

On February 9, 2001, the American submarine USS Greeneville (SSN-772) accidentally struck and sank a Japanese high-school fisheries training ship, Ehime-Maru, killing nine of the 35 Japanese aboard, including four students, 10 miles off the coast of O’ahu. The collision occurred while members of the public were on board the submarine observing an emergency surface drill.

A naval inquiry found that the accident was the result of poorly executed sonar sweeps, an ineffective periscope search by the submarine’s captain, Commander Scott Waddle, bad communication among the crew and distractions caused by the presence of the 16 civilian guests aboard the submarine.

– Wikipedia

Needless to say, this was a horrifying incident for anyone who has served on submarines. It never should have happened.

day 59

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New Photo Gallery – Crowley’s Ridge State Park

June 24, 2009

crowley1

(Crowley’s Ridge State Park photo gallery.)

For the last night of our May 2009 trip, we stopped in northeast Arkansas at Crowley’s Ridge State Park.

Crowley’s Ridge rises 100 to 200 feet above the river plains of eastern Arkansas. A narrow arc of rolling hills, it extends from Cape Girardeau, Missouri, down to the Mississippi River in southeast Arkansas at Helena.

The ridge was named for a War of 1812 soldier, Benjamin F. Crowley, whose war land grant was the first settlement in the area.

crowley2 The park is located near Paragould in Green County at Benjamin Crowley’s original homesite and is one of the original six Arkansas state parks. Construction by the Civilian Conservation Corps began in 1933.

While our stay was just for one night, we did have the opportunity for a couple of good walks and a few pictures in the evening and the next morning before we left. However, As a result of heavy rain, our evening plans for cooking outside didn’t pan out.

In February 2009, Crowley’s Ridge, along with a wide section of Arkansas, Missouri, and Kentucky, experienced a damaging ice storm. Evidence of the storm can still be seen in the ragged appearance from broken and missing branches of many trees in the park and along hundreds of miles of the route we traveled on May 26 and 27.

Haw Creek Galleries