Tag: mountains

Plate tectonics

[podcast]https://edwardwillett.com/wp-content/uploads//2012/03/Plate-Tectonics.mp3[/podcast] Our planet may look like a solid ball of rock, but if you could crack it like an egg (not actually something I’d recommend, although it would make for a fun scene in a science fiction novel or movie) you’d find it’s quite fluid inside. And, in fact, the Earth’s solid shell, called the …

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Photo of the (Yester)Day: Mountain Morning

A final photo from Banff (well, this trip to Banff). After the snowfall on Sunday, Monday dawned bright and beautiful. More photos here. (Fresh ones soon!)

Photo of the Day: Black-and-White Banff*

More photos here. *Actually, this is a colour photo. But you’d be hard-pressed to tell it at first glance.

Avalanches

Every year, on average, avalanches kill 10 people in Canada. In the past few days, two more people were added to this year’s tragic toll as Michel Trudeau, son of former Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau, and Susanna Donald, a University of Calgary student from Regina, became the latest victims of these deadly snowslides, also known …

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High-altitude physiology

It’s called the Death Zone: the region on Mt. Everest above 25,000 feet where the risk of dying is highest. Those risks include hypothermia and frostbite, but the greatest risk of all would exist even if the top of the mountain were as balmy as the Bahamas: high-altitude sickness. Human beings evolved as sea level, …

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Glaciers

The first time I saw Lake Louise, several years ago, its beauty stunned me. Recently I visited it again, and the effect was the same: if it’s not the most beautiful spot on Earth, it’s darn close. What created Lake Louise still hangs above it: a mighty glacier. A drive along the spine of the …

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Mountains

I may be a prairie boy now, but I didn’t start out that way. I was born in Silver City, New Mexico, and as a small child, whenever we went back to New Mexico, I always said we were going to “my mountains.” This time of year, lots of people go to the mountains, even …

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Mountains

I may be a prairie boy now, but I didn’t start out that way. I was born in Silver City, New Mexico, and as a small child, whenever we went back to New Mexico, I always said we were going to “my mountains.” This time of year, lots of people go to the mountains, even …

Continue reading

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