The Ellsworth Mountains are the highest

mountain range A mountain range or hill range is a series of mountains or hills arranged in a line and connected by high ground. A mountain system or mountain belt is a group of mountain ranges with similarity in form, structure, and alignment that have arise ...

s in

Antarctica Antarctica () is Earth's southernmost and least-populated continent. Situated almost entirely south of the Antarctic Circle and surrounded by the Southern Ocean, it contains the geographic South Pole. Antarctica is the fifth-largest contine ...

, forming a long and wide chain of

mountain A mountain is an elevated portion of the Earth's crust, generally with steep sides that show significant exposed bedrock. Although definitions vary, a mountain may differ from a plateau in having a limited Summit (topography), summit area, and ...

s in a north to south configuration on the western margin of the Ronne Ice Shelf in

Marie Byrd Land Marie Byrd Land (MBL) is an unclaimed region of Antarctica. With an area of , it is the largest unclaimed territory on Earth. It was named after the wife of American naval officer Richard E. Byrd, who explored the region in the early 20th centur ...

. They are bisected by

Minnesota Glacier Minnesota Glacier () is a broad glacier, about long and wide, flowing east through the Ellsworth Mountains in Antarctica, separating the Sentinel Range and the Heritage Range. It is nourished by ice from the plateau west of the mountains an ...

to form the

Sentinel Range The Sentinel Range is a major mountain range situated northward of Minnesota Glacier and forming the northern half of the Ellsworth Mountains in Antarctica. The range trends NNW-SSE for about and is 24 to 48 km (15 to 30 mi) wide. Man ...

to the north and the

Heritage Range The Heritage Range is a major mountain range, long and wide, situated southward of Minnesota Glacier and forming the southern half of the Ellsworth Mountains in Antarctica. The range is complex, consisting of scattered ridges and peaks of mod ...

to the south. The former is by far the higher and more spectacular with

Mount Vinson Vinson Massif () is a large mountain massif in Antarctica that is long and wide and lies within the Sentinel Range of the Ellsworth Mountains. It overlooks the Ronne Ice Shelf near the base of the Antarctic Peninsula. The massif is located a ...

() constituting the highest point on the continent.Bockheim, J.G., Schaefer, C.E., 2015. ''Soils of Ellsworth Land, the Ellsworth Mountains''. In: Bockheim, J.G. (Ed.), ''The Soils of Antarctica. World Soils Book Series'', Springer, Switzerland, pp. 169–181. The mountains are located within the Chilean Antarctic territorial claim but outside of the

Argentinian Argentines (mistakenly translated Argentineans in the past; in Spanish (masculine) or ( feminine)) are people identified with the country of Argentina. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Argentines, ...

and

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies. ** Britishness, the British identity and common culture * British English, ...

ones.

Discovery

The mountains were discovered on November 23, 1935, by

Lincoln Ellsworth Lincoln Ellsworth (May 12, 1880 – May 26, 1951) was a polar explorer from the United States and a major benefactor of the American Museum of Natural History. Biography Lincoln Ellsworth was born on May 12, 1880, to James Ellsworth and Eva F ...

in the course of a trans-Antarctic flight from

Dundee Island Dundee Island is an ice-covered island lying east of the northeastern tip of Antarctic Peninsula and south of Joinville Island. It is named after the city of Dundee in Scotland. The Petrel Base is a scientific station in Antarctica belonging t ...

to the

Ross Ice Shelf The Ross Ice Shelf is the largest ice shelf of Antarctica (, an area of roughly and about across: about the size of France). It is several hundred metres thick. The nearly vertical ice front to the open sea is more than long, and between hi ...

. He gave them the descriptive name Sentinel Range. The mountains were mapped in detail by the

U.S. Geological Survey The United States Geological Survey (USGS), formerly simply known as the Geological Survey, is a scientific agency of the United States government. The scientists of the USGS study the landscape of the United States, its natural resources, and ...

from ground surveys and

U.S. Navy The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage o ...

aerial photography, 1958–66. When it became evident that the mountains comprise two distinct ranges, the

US-ACAN The Advisory Committee on Antarctic Names (ACAN or US-ACAN) is an advisory committee of the United States Board on Geographic Names responsible for recommending commemorative names for features in Antarctica. History The committee was established ...

restricted the application of Sentinel Range to the high northern one and gave the name Heritage Range to the southern one; the Committee recommended the name of the discoverer for this entire group of mountains.

Geology

Geologically, the Ellsworth Mountains occupy a discrete block of

continental crust Continental crust is the layer of igneous, sedimentary, and metamorphic rocks that forms the geological continents and the areas of shallow seabed close to their shores, known as continental shelves. This layer is sometimes called ''sial'' be ...

known as the Ellsworth-Whitmore Mountain terrane. This

terrane In geology, a terrane (; in full, a tectonostratigraphic terrane) is a crust fragment formed on a tectonic plate (or broken off from it) and accreted or " sutured" to crust lying on another plate. The crustal block or fragment preserves its own ...

was part of the early

Paleozoic The Paleozoic (or Palaeozoic) Era is the earliest of three geologic eras of the Phanerozoic Eon. The name ''Paleozoic'' ( ;) was coined by the British geologist Adam Sedgwick in 1838 by combining the Greek words ''palaiós'' (, "old") and ' ...

amalgamation of

Gondwana Gondwana () was a large landmass, often referred to as a supercontinent, that formed during the late Neoproterozoic (about 550 million years ago) and began to break up during the Jurassic period (about 180 million years ago). The final stages ...

and consists of a thick section of folded

Cambrian The Cambrian Period ( ; sometimes symbolized C with bar, Ꞓ) was the first geological period of the Paleozoic Era, and of the Phanerozoic Eon. The Cambrian lasted 53.4 million years from the end of the preceding Ediacaran Period 538.8 million ...

–

Permian The Permian ( ) is a geologic period and stratigraphic system which spans 47 million years from the end of the Carboniferous Period million years ago (Mya), to the beginning of the Triassic Period 251.9 Mya. It is the last period of the Paleoz ...

strata In geology and related fields, a stratum ( : strata) is a layer of rock or sediment characterized by certain lithologic properties or attributes that distinguish it from adjacent layers from which it is separated by visible surfaces known as ei ...

, which accumulated on Grenville-age continental crust. It was likely once part of the

Cape Fold Belt The Cape Fold Belt is a fold and thrust belt of late Paleozoic age, which affected the sequence of sedimentary rock layers of the Cape Supergroup in the southwestern corner of South Africa. It was originally continuous with the Ventana Mount ...

that was detached from southern

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...

during the breakup of Gondwana and later incorporated into Antarctica.Craddock, J.P., Schmitz, M.D., Crowley, J.L., Larocque, J., Pankhurst, R.J., Juda, N., Konstantinou, A. and Storey, B., 2017. ''Precise U-Pb zircon ages and geochemistry of Jurassic granites, Ellsworth-Whitmore terrane, central Antarctica''. ''Geological Society of America Bulletin'', 129(1-2), pp.118-136. The

stratigraphy Stratigraphy is a branch of geology concerned with the study of rock (geology), rock layers (Stratum, strata) and layering (stratification). It is primarily used in the study of sedimentary rock, sedimentary and layered volcanic rocks. Stratigrap ...

consists of the thick

Early Cambrian The Cambrian Period ( ; sometimes symbolized Ꞓ) was the first geological period of the Paleozoic Era, and of the Phanerozoic Eon. The Cambrian lasted 53.4 million years from the end of the preceding Ediacaran Period 538.8 million years ago ( ...

Middle Cambrian Middle or The Middle may refer to: * Centre (geometry), the point equally distant from the outer limits. Places * Middle (sheading), a subdivision of the Isle of Man * Middle Bay (disambiguation) * Middle Brook (disambiguation) * Middle Creek (di ...

Heritage Group overlain by the thick

Late Cambrian Late may refer to: * LATE, an acronym which could stand for: ** Limbic-predominant age-related TDP-43 encephalopathy, a proposed form of dementia ** Local-authority trading enterprise, a New Zealand business law ** Local average treatment effect, ...

Devonian The Devonian ( ) is a geologic period and system of the Paleozoic era, spanning 60.3 million years from the end of the Silurian, million years ago (Mya), to the beginning of the Carboniferous, Mya. It is named after Devon, England, whe ...

Crashsite Group; the thick

Permo-Carboniferous The Permo-Carboniferous refers to the time period including the latter parts of the Carboniferous and early part of the Permian period. Permo-Carboniferous rocks are in places not differentiated because of the presence of transitional fossils, and ...

Whiteout Conglomerate (black diamictite) from Gondawanaland glaciation; and the thick

Polarstar

Formation Formation may refer to: Linguistics * Back-formation, the process of creating a new lexeme by removing or affixes * Word formation, the creation of a new word by adding affixes Mathematics and science * Cave formation or speleothem, a secondar ...

consisting of black

argillite :''"Argillite" may also refer to Argillite, Kentucky.'' Argillite () is a fine-grained sedimentary rock composed predominantly of indurated clay particles. Argillaceous rocks are basically lithified muds and oozes. They contain variable amounts ...

siltstone Siltstone, also known as aleurolite, is a clastic sedimentary rock that is composed mostly of silt. It is a form of mudrock with a low clay mineral content, which can be distinguished from shale by its lack of fissility.Blatt ''et al.'' 1980, p ...

sandstone Sandstone is a clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate grains. Sandstones comprise about 20–25% of all sedimentary rocks. Most sandstone is composed of quartz or feldspar (both silicates) ...

, and coal. Within the Heritage Group is the Union Glacier Formation of ashflow

tuff Tuff is a type of rock made of volcanic ash ejected from a vent during a volcanic eruption. Following ejection and deposition, the ash is lithified into a solid rock. Rock that contains greater than 75% ash is considered tuff, while rock cont ...

lahar A lahar (, from jv, ꦮ꧀ꦭꦲꦂ) is a violent type of mudflow or debris flow composed of a slurry of pyroclastic material, rocky debris and water. The material flows down from a volcano, typically along a river valley. Lahars are extreme ...

deposits, the Hyde Glacier Formation of

graywacke Greywacke or graywacke (German ''grauwacke'', signifying a grey, earthy rock) is a variety of sandstone generally characterized by its hardness, dark color, and poorly sorted angular grains of quartz, feldspar, and small rock fragments or lit ...

-argillite-conglomerate, the Drake Icefall Formation of black shales and marble, the Conglomerate Ridge Formation of conglomerate and

quartzite Quartzite is a hard, non- foliated metamorphic rock which was originally pure quartz sandstone.Essentials of Geology, 3rd Edition, Stephen Marshak, p 182 Sandstone is converted into quartzite through heating and pressure usually related to tect ...

, the Liberty Hills-Springer Peak-Frazier Ridge Formations of quartzite-argillite, and the Minaret Formation of marble. Within the Crashsite Group is the Howard Nunataks Formation of quartzites, the Mt. Liptak Formation of quartzites, and the Mount Wyatt Earp Formation of quartzites. Major deformation of the

sedimentary rocks Sedimentary rocks are types of rock that are formed by the accumulation or deposition of mineral or organic particles at Earth's surface, followed by cementation. Sedimentation is the collective name for processes that cause these particles t ...

occurred during the

Gondwanide orogeny The Gondwanide orogeny was an orogeny active in the Permian that affected parts of Gondwana that are by current geography now located in southern South America, South Africa, Antarctica, Australia and New Guinea. The zone of deformation in Arge ...

, followed by later

uplift Uplift may refer to: Science * Geologic uplift, a geological process ** Tectonic uplift, a geological process * Stellar uplift, the theoretical prospect of moving a stellar mass * Uplift mountains * Llano Uplift * Nemaha Uplift Business * Uplif ...

Climate

The temperatures in the Ellsworth Mountains average around -30 °C (-20 °F). The best time for expeditions are November through January, mid-summer in the Southern Hemisphere. However, arranging an outing here is a difficult task, requiring either official scientific sponsorship or considerable financial resources.

Maps

Newcomer Glacier.
Scale 1:250 000 topographic map. Reston, Virginia: US Geological Survey, 1961.
Vinson Massif.
Scale 1:250 000 topographic map. Reston, Virginia: US Geological Survey, 1988.
Union Glacier.
Scale 1:250 000 topographic map. Reston, Virginia: US Geological Survey, 1966.
Liberty Hills.
Scale 1:250 000 topographic map. Reston, Virginia: US Geological Survey, 1966.
Antarctic Digital Database (ADD).
Scale 1:250000 topographic map of Antarctica. Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR). Since 1993, regularly updated.

Gallery

Northern-Sentinel-Map.jpg , Northern

, USGS map Vinson-Map.jpg , Central and southern

, USGS map Vinson-Massif.jpg , The central part of the mountains with

Vinson Plateau Vinson Plateau is the summit plateau of Vinson Massif, Sentinel Range in Ellsworth Mountains, Antarctica. It extends for 9 km between Goodge Col and Hammer Col linking it to the north-central part of Sentinel Range to the north-northwest an ...

, NASA satellite image Union-Glacier.jpg , Northern

, USGS map Liberty-Hills.jpg , Southern

, USGS map Mount Gardner from SW by Christian Stangl (flickr).jpg ,

Mount Gardner Mount Gardner () is a mountain, high, standing west of Mount Tyree in the west-central part of the Sentinel Range, in the Ellsworth Mountains of Antarctica. It surmounts Patton Glacier to the northeast. The peak was discovered by the Mar ...

Mount Press, Ellsworth Mountains, Antarctica.jpg , Mount Press Mount Shinn from North East by Christian Stangl (flickr).jpg , Mount Shinn Mount Tyree (Antarctica) from East by Christian Stangl (flickr).jpg ,

Mount Tyree Mount is often used as part of the name of specific mountains, e.g. Mount Everest. Mount or Mounts may also refer to: Places * Mount, Cornwall, a village in Warleggan parish, England * Mount, Perranzabuloe, a hamlet in Perranzabuloe parish, C ...

File:Mount Vinson from NW at Vinson Plateau by Christian Stangl (flickr).jpg ,

References

External links

* tp://ftp.data.pgc.umn.edu/maps/antarctica/ags/03/pdf/Ellsworth%20Mountains.pdf Geologic Map of the Ellsworth Mountains
Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR)

Ellsworth Mountains.
SCAR

Composite Gazetteer of Antarctica The Composite Gazetteer of Antarctica (CGA) of the Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR) is the authoritative international gazetteer containing all Antarctic toponyms published in national gazetteers, plus basic information about th ...

{{Authority control West Antarctica Mountain ranges of Ellsworth Land Filchner-Ronne Ice Shelf