Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
186
dogs and men clung to their spot. Blackburn logged the next day that “Wind blew a half
gale on last nite threatening to blow away the tents. But they held being anchored and
held down by rox.”
The next morning the wind was nearly as strong, so rather than break camp Black-
burn and Paine hiked southwest to check the route that lay ahead. Having rounded the
end of the spur where they were camped, the men found themselves in a calm area where
apparently the wind seldom blew. Scrambling over ice-cored moraine and pressure swells
to gain some elevation, they were able to see that a clear way lay to the southwest, directly
toward a dome-shaped mountain capped by sedimentary strata, and that not far ahead,
the blue ice, so persistent up until now, gave way to snow-covered glacier (see Fig. 6.2).
The men returned to break camp, and by 3:00 P.M. were driving south again. At 5:40
the party stopped to prepare for a scheduled radio check. Again Little America suggested
that the party abandon its course and head eastward, to which Paine “replied in the nega-
tive.” He fumed in his diary, “It's absurd—75 miles up, almost to the plateau. Our goal in
sight, nine days in the field gone + he wants us to give it all up—bunk directing.”
The following day was an excellent run of nineteen miles, bringing the party to the
northern end of Mount Wilber, a ragged outcropping of granite with wild drifts clinging
to the upper reaches of its eastern face (Fig. 6.8). A few miles to the west, beyond a broad
icefall, rose Mount Weaver (Fig. 6.9). Its base was granite, but above the unconformity
fully 90 percent of the mountain was sedimentary strata, layer upon layer of tan and green
and brown, rising finally to a summit capped by a sill of umber dolerite. Compared with
the massifs that the men had passed in the middle reaches of Scott Glacier, Mount Weaver
was diminutive and plain. Its summit was nearly flat and its overall appearance blocky.
From bottom to top the smooth, north face measured about two thousand feet, with a
prominent spur leading down from the summit toward the northeast.
Figure 6.8. Mount Wilber
stands as one of the first
obstructions to the draft
of katabatic winds that
funnel into upper Scott
Glacier. At its eastern end,
wind running up the back-
side is compressed and
wind that rounds the cor-
ner at a lower elevation is
draw by the Venturi effect
vertically up the rocky face,
producing wild drifts like
horsetails that end at the
upper edge. Blackburn's
party camped under this
face for one night before
moving over to Mount
Weaver.
