Mount Fairchild, also known as Mount William Fairchild, is a glaciated mountain
summit
A summit is a point on a surface that is higher in elevation than all points immediately adjacent to it. The topography, topographic terms acme, apex, peak (mountain peak), and zenith are synonymous.
The term (mountain top) is generally used ...
located within
Olympic National Park in
Clallam County
Clallam County is a county in the U.S. state of Washington. As of the 2020 census, the population was 77,155, with an estimated population of 78,209 in 2021. The county seat and largest city is Port Angeles; the county as a whole comprises the ...
of
Washington state.
Mt. Fairchild is the second-highest peak in the
Bailey Range, which is a subrange of the
Olympic Mountains. Its nearest higher neighbor is
Mount Carrie, to the southwest, and
Ruth Peak
Ruth Peak is a glaciated mountain summit located within Olympic National Park in Clallam County of Washington state. Ruth Peak is the third-highest peak in the Bailey Range, which is a subrange of the Olympic Mountains. Its nearest higher neigh ...
is set to the south.
In clear weather, the mountain can be seen from the visitor center at
Hurricane Ridge
Hurricane Ridge is a mountainous area in Washington's Olympic National Park. Approximately by road from Port Angeles, the ridge is open to hiking, skiing, and snowboarding and is one of the two most visited sites in the national park (along with ...
. Precipitation
runoff from the mountain drains into tributaries of the
Elwha River.
History
Mount Fairchild is situated at the head of Fairchild Creek, which originates from the
Fairchild Glacier, and each are named for pilot William R. Fairchild (1926–1969), who flew hundreds of photographic flights to support scientific studies of glaciers in the Olympic Mountains for the U. S. Geological Survey and U.S. National Park Service, as well as thousands of other glaciers in Western North America.
Fairchild's method of taking off from the nearby
Blue Glacier became known as the "Fairchild sleigh ride", and was seen in a climactic scene in a two-part show in the "
Lassie
Lassie is a fictional female Rough Collie dog and is featured in a short story by Eric Knight that was later expanded to a full-length novel called ''Lassie Come-Home''. Knight's portrayal of Lassie bears some features in common with another fic ...
" TV series. Fairchild was one of 10 who tragically died when the air taxi service he created crashed on February 5, 1969, immediately after take-off from Port Angeles, en route to Seattle. This mountain's name was officially adopted in 1975 by the
U.S. Board on Geographic Names.
The
William R. Fairchild International Airport in nearby
Port Angeles
Port Angeles ( ) is a city and county seat of Clallam County, Washington, United States. With a population of 19,960 as of the 2020 census, it is the largest city in the county. The population was estimated at 20,134 in 2021.
The city's har ...
is also named after him.
The
first ascent of this peak was made in 1963 by Denny Pruitt, Dan Baker, Jack Christiansen, and Roy Etten.
[Olympic Mountain Rescue, ''Olympic Mountains, A climbing Guide'', Fourth Edition, The Mountaineers Books, 2006, pg. 190.]
Climate
Based on the
Köppen climate classification, Mount Fairchild is located in the
marine west coast climate zone of western
North America
North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and the Car ...
.
This climate supports the Fairchild and
Carrie Glaciers on its slopes. Most
weather fronts originate in the
Pacific Ocean, and travel northeast toward the
Olympic Mountains. As fronts approach, they are forced upward by the peaks of the Olympic Range, causing them to drop their moisture in the form of rain or snowfall (
Orographic lift). As a result, the Olympics experience high precipitation, especially during the winter months. During winter months, weather is usually cloudy, but, due to high pressure systems over the Pacific Ocean that intensify during summer months, there is often little or no cloud cover during the summer. In terms of favorable weather, the best months for viewing and climbing are July through September.
Geology
The Olympic Mountains are composed of
obducted clastic
Clastic rocks are composed of fragments, or clasts, of pre-existing minerals and rock. A clast is a fragment of geological detritus,Essentials of Geology, 3rd Ed, Stephen Marshak, p. G-3 chunks, and smaller grains of rock broken off other rocks ...
wedge material and oceanic crust, primarily
Eocene sandstone,
turbidite, and
basaltic oceanic crust.
The mountains were sculpted during the
Pleistocene era by erosion and glaciers advancing and retreating multiple times.
See also
*
Olympic Mountains
*
Geology of the Pacific Northwest
References
External links
*
* Mount Fairchild
weather forecast
{{DEFAULTSORT:Fairchild
Olympic Mountains
Mountains of Washington (state)
Landforms of Olympic National Park
North American 2000 m summits