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rottingjohnny
Sport climber
Sands Motel , Las Vegas
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Aug 25, 2018 - 08:18am PT
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Could have been a mis-fire from a big beautiful Space Force attack ship...?
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Aug 25, 2018 - 08:21am PT
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Dearest Fritzi, I made topo maps in my yute. BDA is an inprecise science, especially given the paucity and lack of detail.
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Jon Beck
Trad climber
Oceanside
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Aug 25, 2018 - 08:28am PT
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Rotational slump
And it is huge
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Fritz
Social climber
Choss Creek, ID
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Topic Author's Reply - Aug 25, 2018 - 08:52am PT
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Let's refresh some aged memories here.
A distant shot of 11,825' Altair Peak & the new crater from a saddle just east of Standhope Peak, about 9/10 of a mile away.
A topo of that area with the red measurement showing 9/10 mile, line of sight to the top of Altair Peak. The previous photo shows a trail, which doesn't show on this map, but it connects Betty Lake to Goat lake & goes through the saddle I start the line of sight at. I've been there & climbed Standhope Peak from that saddle.
A close-up photo of the 300' - 350' diameter crater, which does not appear to be a slump.
My Google Earth measurement of my estimate of the crater's position & size. It measured 350' in diameter.
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TwistedCrank
climber
Released into general population, Idaho
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Aug 25, 2018 - 10:27am PT
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It was an accident. Swear.
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Fritz
Social climber
Choss Creek, ID
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Topic Author's Reply - Aug 25, 2018 - 10:40am PT
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Cosmic! Thank you!
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Aug 25, 2018 - 11:52am PT
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Tut, I already addressed the aviation issues. Honestly, I don’t see enough, if any, lateral ejecta for a bomb. Even an unarmed bomb would cause that but wouldn’t produce the nice curvaceous shape. How come nobody has suggested a mini-meteorite? And where are the resident ST geologists?
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Jon Beck
Trad climber
Oceanside
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Aug 25, 2018 - 12:43pm PT
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Kinda reminds me of the "dinosaur tracks" near Tuba City. We took a tour from a young Navajo boy and he showed us all sorts of impressive tracks. We googled them later and found out that most were random shapes that looked like they could be from a dinosaur. Some were real though.
Look at google images for rotational slumping and you will see lots of nice curved features
I think a small meteor would make some noise too (as reported), wouldn't it? Start that rumor and the crazies are going to go looking for it, those meteors are valuable. Wear you avi beacon if you go up there
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Woody the Beaver
Trad climber
Soldier, Idaho
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Aug 25, 2018 - 02:23pm PT
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Sheepherder fart crater?
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StahlBro
Trad climber
San Diego, CA
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Aug 25, 2018 - 03:01pm PT
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As previously stated, slump.
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Fritz
Social climber
Choss Creek, ID
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Topic Author's Reply - Aug 25, 2018 - 03:13pm PT
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Thanks folks, for your valuable input on this "disturbing" alteration of Idaho's fragile alpine terrain.
Undoubtedly, important Pika nesting & feeding ground was destroyed & it's likely nearby mountain goats were killed or traumatized.
Why won't the government do something?
From the first post about this tragedy, on the Idaho Outdoor Forum:
Some friends and I backpacked to Baptie Lake last weekend intending to climb Altair and Standhope Peak. We climbed Standhope and discovered a huge crater/depression on the south face of Altair that apparently is quite new. The trail that leads to Surprise Valley is completely buried by debris from the crater and the mountain appears to still be quite unstable as new rockfall from the top of the crater continued to come crashing down every 5-10 minutes. My friend called the ranger station and they were unaware of this and the crater doesn't seem to be present in photos taken just last week. Anyone know how or when this happened? Must have been quite a show from Betty Lake!!
Rockfall over the Surprise Valley trail.
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Spider Savage
Mountain climber
The shaggy fringe of Los Angeles
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Aug 25, 2018 - 03:48pm PT
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Strong argument for slump due to no visible sign of ejecta to sides or above.
Seems odd though. The depth of the crater looks less like a slump.
Gravitational forces show the result. Cause is mysterious.
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SalNichols
Big Wall climber
Richmond, CA
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Aug 25, 2018 - 04:04pm PT
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We don't own a conventional weapon that would do that. Not even MOAB. Its a natural slump.
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Aug 25, 2018 - 04:21pm PT
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We don't own a conventional weapon that would do that
Funniest thing I’ve read all week! MOAB’s are air bursters, of course they wouldn’t do that.
Do google bunker busters, mate.
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fear
Ice climber
hartford, ct
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Aug 25, 2018 - 09:56pm PT
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Bunker busters of the non-nuke variety are typically low yield but with high penetration relying mainly on extremely high speed. No way it'd blast a hole that big.
Gotta get those old beachcomber people up there with metal detectors to look for shrapnel.... maybe bring a good small alpha/beta/gamma rig too...
I'm leaning towards some natural oddity if there's no metal and no cesium....
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Minerals
Social climber
The Deli
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Aug 25, 2018 - 11:22pm PT
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Oh, this is on the west side of Copper Basin... I’ve been in there a few times; cool place.
Gravity vs. Peak and Gravity wins this round. It’s a slump.
Like Fritz, I measured about 350 feet from side to side on the “crater,” using Google Earth (horizontal yellow line). I also took a shot a drawing a rough outline of the “crater,” with the lower boundary at the top of the fresh talus slope. I have a triangular point on the upper left of this outline, which isn’t part of the viewed “crater,” however if you look closely at the “crater” photo, you will see a brown line extending to the left of the top of the “crater” which terminates at the change in slope angle, where the fractured bedrock rises to the left of the “crater.” I interpret the brown color to be weathering of the top 10-20 feet or so of talus, and displacement of this section of talus to the left of the “crater” has exposed the brown color of the rock below the surface. You can also see the brown color around the highest extent of the slope failure (top margin of the “crater”) and in the fresh talus below the “crater.” You can also see lighter colored patches in the fresh talus slope, which are most likely concentrations of rock dust that was generated during the collapse event.
As has already been mentioned more than once, there is no sign of any ejecta or fresh debris above or to the sides of the “crater.” There’s no way that this feature could be created by an explosion or an impact without a hell of a lot of fresh material all around the “crater.” We only see fresh material downslope of the “crater” in the photos, and nowhere else.
Recent impact craters on the Moon have ejecta rays extending from the crater. There is no evidence of this on Altair Peak in the photos.
A small seismic event could have triggered the slump, but it couldn’t have been a very big seismic event, because otherwise you’d see other slide activity in the area, and I see no evidence of recent slide activity on that whole talus slope area, aside from what’s below the “crater.”
Compare the two images below, before and after. You can also use Google Earth as a ‘before’ image.
Aside from the fresh talus field below the “crater,” all of the large boulders on the rest of the talus slope on that side of the peak are in the same place, and the talus patterns and colors match from photo to photo. There is no change to the rest of the talus slope.
The slump feature does very much have the appearance of a crater, but I think a lot of that is due to the camera angle and the lighting/sun angle. The photos of the “crater” were taken from the pass between the two lakes, and that vantage point is much lower in elevation than the location of the “crater.” Therefore, there is optical foreshortening of the side of the peak, and the slump area appears as a round crater to the viewer. I bet if you were to view the feature from above in a helicopter, it would have much more of an oval shape with the long axis oriented upslope/downslope.
And if you still aren’t convinced that the “crater” wasn’t created by a “bomb,” watch these videos and note the shockwave that emanates from the explosions. Any explosion that would be big enough to even get close to creating that “crater” would have one hell of a shockwave that would disrupt the talus fields in that entire area, which are already at or near their angle of repose. You would see all kinds of evidence of fresh slides all along the peak. And how about the seismic vibration of such an explosion? That would shake the bedrock (fractured-to-hell granitic rock) enough to disrupt the talus fields as well.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angle_of_repose
[Click to View YouTube Video]
[Click to View YouTube Video]
[Click to View YouTube Video]
[Click to View YouTube Video]
You can take your tinfoil hats off now...
And for an additional two cents, I found a couple of geologic maps of the area, for Fritz and anyone else who might be interested...
Nice colorful map, with lots of info, but it doesn’t quite include these peaks on the right side of the map.
https://ngmdb.usgs.gov/Prodesc/proddesc_9151.htm
Basic geo map, with hand-drawn contacts and labels that are hard to read, but it does cover the area of the peaks.
https://pubs.usgs.gov/of/1976/0075/plate-1.pdf
The bedrock of Altair and Standhope Peaks is most definitely granitic rock, which is shown as Eocene in age on the geo maps. (Eocene = about 34 Ma to 56 Ma; Ma = million years ago.)
For reference, the youngest granitic rocks in the Sierra are around 85 Ma, and the Johnson Granite in the central part of the Tuolumne Intrusive Suite (Tuolumne Store...) is about 85 Ma in age.
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John M
climber
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Aug 25, 2018 - 11:32pm PT
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A small seismic event could have triggered the slump, but it couldn’t have been a very big seismic event, because otherwise you’d see other slide activity in the area, and I see no evidence of recent slide activity on that whole talus slope area, aside from what’s below the “crater.”
Based on the original story of jets in the area. Could a sonic boom cause it?
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Minerals
Social climber
The Deli
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Aug 25, 2018 - 11:43pm PT
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Based on the original story of jets in the area. Could a sonic boom cause it?
Not sure. I suppose it would depend on how low the jets were and how close they were to the peaks when and if they broke the sound barrier. If that section of the peak was already at the point where it was ready to go, it might not have needed much of a trigger. As we have seen with Yosemite Valley rockfalls, the thermal cycle of expansion and contraction during the hot summer months can be a trigger mechanism. That section of Altair Peak faces south and this July was pretty dang hot. But I am not a geomorphologist; I study how the rocks got there in the first place, not how they are taken away. This is Greg Stock’s territory.
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Fritz
Social climber
Choss Creek, ID
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Topic Author's Reply - Aug 26, 2018 - 07:52am PT
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Minerals! Thank you for taking the time to look at that "slump" on Altair Peak. I appreciate your expertise too.
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