
The Brown Range or Sørtindane Peaks () is a group of seven
peaks in the
Framnes Mountains about south of
Mount Twintop
Mount Twintop () is a twin-peaked mountain about 6 nautical miles (11 km) south-southwest of Mount Tritoppen in the south part of the David Range, Framnes Mountains. Immediately north of Mount Twintop are the Butler Nunataks, and Venture Do ...
in
Mac. Robertson Land
Mac. Robertson Land is the portion of Antarctica lying southward of the coast between William Scoresby Bay and Cape Darnley. It is located at . In the east, Mac. Robertson Land includes the Prince Charles Mountains. It was named by the British Au ...
,
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 ...
.
Exploration
Norwegian cartographers mapped two of the peaks from aerial photographs taken by the Lars Christensen Expedition in 1936, and named them the Sørtindane (South Mountain) Peaks.
They are named for D. A. Brown, who was a radio operator at
Mawson Station
The Mawson Station, commonly called Mawson, is one of three permanent bases and research outposts in Antarctica managed by the Australian Antarctic Division (AAD). Mawson lies in Holme Bay in Mac. Robertson Land, East Antarctica in the Austra ...
in 1958.
Description
The Framnes Mountains have elevations up to above sea level, and rise up to above the ice surface.
They have dark, weathered
charnockite bedrock that is littered with light-colored quartz-rich,
granitic gneiss
Gneiss ( ) is a common and widely distributed type of metamorphic rock. It is formed by high-temperature and high-pressure metamorphic processes acting on formations composed of igneous or sedimentary rocks. Gneiss forms at higher temperatures an ...
glacial erratics.
The Brown Range is about inland.
During the late
Quaternary
The Quaternary ( ) is the current and most recent of the three periods of the Cenozoic Era in the geologic time scale of the International Commission on Stratigraphy (ICS). It follows the Neogene Period and spans from 2.58 million years ...
the ice sheet thickened by about at the Brown Range.
Features
Simpson Ridge
. An isolated, sharp, serrated ridge situated south of Mount Twintop in the Framnes Mountains, Mac. Robertson Land. Mapped from ANARE surveys, 1954-62. Named by ANCA for C.R. Simpson, electronics engineer at Mawson Station in 1967.
Gordon Peak
Gordon Peak () is in the center of the Brown Range and is its the highest peak at about above sea level.
The two main peaks in this range were plotted by Norwegian cartographers from air photographs taken by the Lars Christensen Expedition (1936).
Gordon Peak was used as an unoccupied Trigonometrical station by Max J. Corry, surveyor at Mawson in 1965.
It is named for P.J. Gordon, radio technician at
Mawson Station
The Mawson Station, commonly called Mawson, is one of three permanent bases and research outposts in Antarctica managed by the Australian Antarctic Division (AAD). Mawson lies in Holme Bay in Mac. Robertson Land, East Antarctica in the Austra ...
in 1965.
Notes
References
Sources
*
*
*
*
mountain ranges of Mac. Robertson Land
{{MacRobertsonLand-geo-stub