I grew up on the eastern border of these coulees and canyons of scabrock. For me, only an indigenous perspective has come close to describing the innate power of this place. It is a primal landscape.
I found it especially interesting that they referenced a 1926 flood outside of Walla Walla that exposed several layers of silt, each layer deposited by a single, discreet flood. At the bottom of the canyon was a layer of ash which was analyzed and found to have come from Mt. St. Helens. It was carbon dated at 15,000 years. But there were 39 separate layers of silt on top of it. It is surmised that Lake Missoula formed again and again, flooding every 60 years. If we multiply the 39 layers of silt by 60 year intervals, that means after St. Helen's eruption 15,000 years ago, the floods continued for approximately another 2,340 years. That would put the last flood at about 12,660 years ago -- into the age of human habitation.
I'd be interested to know what legends the tribes native to the Columbia Plateau have about the Great Floods-- did they tell the story for all the many thousands of years since, for all their succeeding generations? This is narrated, believe it or not, by Captain Picard. Really.
No comments:
Post a Comment