Mount Murchison is a mountain summit located at the convergence of the

North Saskatchewan River The North Saskatchewan River is a glacier-fed river that flows from the Canadian Rockies continental divide east to central Saskatchewan, where it joins with the South Saskatchewan River to make up the Saskatchewan River. Its water flows eventual ...

valley and Mistaya River valley of

Banff National Park Banff National Park is Canada's oldest National Parks of Canada, national park, established in 1885 as Rocky Mountains Park. Located in Alberta's Rockies, Alberta's Rocky Mountains, west of Calgary, Banff encompasses of mountainous terrain, wi ...

, in the

Canadian Rockies The Canadian Rockies (french: Rocheuses canadiennes) or Canadian Rocky Mountains, comprising both the Alberta Rockies and the British Columbian Rockies, is the Canadian segment of the North American Rocky Mountains. It is the easternmost part ...

Alberta Alberta ( ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is part of Western Canada and is one of the three prairie provinces. Alberta is bordered by British Columbia to the west, Saskatchewan to the east, the Northwest Ter ...

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

. The main summit has two high points: the Southeast Peak is 3,353 m, whereas the Northwest Peak is 3,333 m and separated by 700 m distance. Its nearest higher peak is

Mount Cline Mount Cline is a mountain in western Alberta, Canada, north of Saskatchewan Crossing, southwest of Nordegg. The mountain is located in the North Saskatchewan River Valley, west of Resolute Mountain. It was named in 1898 by J. Norman Coll ...

, to the north. Mount Murchison is situated immediately southeast of the confluence of the

, Mistaya River, and

Howse River The Howse River is a tributary of the North Saskatchewan River in western Alberta, Canada. The Howse River is a braided river, with several streams crossing in its flood plain. It is formed when Freshfield, Forbes, David and Lagoon Creek unite a ...

near Saskatchewan Crossing, where the

Icefields Parkway Highway 93 is a north–south highway in Alberta, Canada. It is also known as the Banff-Windermere Parkway south of the Trans-Canada Highway ( Highway 1) and the Icefields Parkway north of the Trans-Canada Highway. It travels through ...

intersects with the

David Thompson Highway #redirectAlberta Highway 11 Alberta Provincial Highway No. 11, commonly referred to as Highway 11 and officially named the David Thompson Highway, is a provincial highway in central Alberta, Canada. It runs for from Highway 93 ...

History

Named by

James Hector Sir James Hector (16 March 1834 – 6 November 1907) was a Scottish-New Zealand geologist, naturalist, and surgeon who accompanied the Palliser Expedition as a surgeon and geologist. He went on to have a lengthy career as a government employe ...

as he traversed the Mistaya Valley in September of 1858, Mount Murchison honors Sir Roderick Impey Murchison (1792-1871), a prominent English geologist and director of the Geological Survey of Great Britain. The mountain's name became official in 1924. The first ascent of the Northwest Peak was in 1902 by Norman Collie, H.E.M. Stutfield, G.M. Weed, and Hans Kaufmann. The

first ascent In mountaineering, a first ascent (abbreviated to FA in guide books) is the first successful, documented attainment of the top of a mountain or the first to follow a particular climbing route. First mountain ascents are notable because they en ...

of the Southeast Peak was made August 25, 1996, by Reg Bonney, Rick Collier, John Holmes, and Jerre Skvaril.

Geology

Like other mountains in Banff Park, the Murchison

massif In geology, a massif ( or ) is a section of a planet's crust that is demarcated by faults or flexures. In the movement of the crust, a massif tends to retain its internal structure while being displaced as a whole. The term also refers to a ...

is composed of

sedimentary rock 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 ...

laid down during the

Precambrian The Precambrian (or Pre-Cambrian, sometimes abbreviated pꞒ, or Cryptozoic) is the earliest part of Earth's history, set before the current Phanerozoic Eon. The Precambrian is so named because it preceded the Cambrian, the first period of the ...

Jurassic The Jurassic ( ) is a Geological period, geologic period and System (stratigraphy), stratigraphic system that spanned from the end of the Triassic Period million years ago (Mya) to the beginning of the Cretaceous Period, approximately Mya. The J ...

periods. Formed in shallow seas, this sedimentary rock was pushed east and over the top of younger rock during the

Laramide orogeny The Laramide orogeny was a time period of mountain building in western North America, which started in the Late Cretaceous, 70 to 80 million years ago, and ended 35 to 55 million years ago. The exact duration and ages of beginning and end of the o ...

. The massif, which covers an area measuring five km by seven km (7400 acres), is characterized by seven rocky towers and glacial ice of the ''Murchison Icefield''.

Towers of Murchison

Climate

Based on the

Köppen climate classification The Köppen climate classification is one of the most widely used climate classification systems. It was first published by German-Russian climatologist Wladimir Köppen (1846–1940) in 1884, with several later modifications by Köppen, notabl ...

, Mount Murchison is located in a

subarctic climate The subarctic climate (also called subpolar climate, or boreal climate) is a climate with long, cold (often very cold) winters, and short, warm to cool summers. It is found on large landmasses, often away from the moderating effects of an ocean, ge ...

with cold, snowy winters, and mild summers. Temperatures can drop below -20 °C with wind chill factors below -30 °C. Weather conditions during winter make Mount Murchison a destination in the Rockies for ice climbing.

Precipitation In meteorology, precipitation is any product of the condensation of atmospheric water vapor that falls under gravitational pull from clouds. The main forms of precipitation include drizzle, rain, sleet, snow, ice pellets, graupel and hail. ...

runoff Runoff, run-off or RUNOFF may refer to: * RUNOFF, the first computer text-formatting program * Runoff or run-off, another name for bleed, printing that lies beyond the edges to which a printed sheet is trimmed * Runoff or run-off, a stock market ...

from Mount Murchison drains into tributaries of the

Saskatchewan River The Saskatchewan River (Cree: ''kisiskāciwani-sīpiy'', "swift flowing river") is a major river in Canada. It stretches about from where it is formed by the joining together of the North Saskatchewan and South Saskatchewan Rivers to Lake Winn ...

Ice Climbing Routes

Ice Climbing Routes with

grades Grade most commonly refers to: * Grade (education), a measurement of a student's performance * Grade, the number of the year a student has reached in a given educational stage * Grade (slope), the steepness of a slope Grade or grading may also r ...

on Mount MurchisonMount Murchison
SummitPost * ''But My Daddy's a Psycho'' - WI5 * ''Murchison Falls'' - WI4-5 * ''Virtual Reality'' - WI6 * ''Balfour Wall'' - WI 2-4 * ''Cosmic Messenger'' - WI5 * ''Imaginary Voyage'' - WI3 * ''Laughter in the Dark'' - WI4 * ''Alien Abduction'' - WI5 * ''Syndrome'' - WI6

Gallery

File:Peyto Lake Overlook of Mistaya Valley.jpg, Towers of Murchison File:Mount Murchison.jpg, North aspect File:Banff Park Mount Murchison.jpg, The north aspect of Mount Murchison File:Towers of Mt. Murchison.jpg, Towers of Mt. Murchison

History

Geology

Towers of Murchison

Climate

Ice Climbing Routes

Gallery

See also

References

External links