Talk:Lassen Peak

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For Google: Devastated Area

Data on Eruptions
I found this on the eruption of Lassen Peak: "Phreatic eruptions are frequent precursors of magmatic eruptions on many stratovolcanoes; and one of the most sustained periods of phreatic activity this century occurred on the dacitic dome of Lassen Peak in the Cascade Range. The first 170 explosions between 29 May 1914 and 14 May 1915 were phreatic, expelling steam and fragments shattered from the dome that sometimes rose 3km above the summit. The main explosions occurred at quite regular intervals: 14 June, 18 July, 19 August, 21 September, 22 October… perhaps representing the time required for snowmelt and rainwater to infiltrate the dome and meet the magma. At first, the fragments ejected were not even warm enough to melt the summit snows; and the first hot ash did not emerge until 22 October 1914, showing that magma was approaching the surface. On 14 May 1915, rapid snowmelt caused the last phreatic throat-clearing explosion that opened the vent for the first emission of magma and a change of eruptive style." Scarth, Alwyn. Volcanoes : An Introduction. London, UK: CRC Press, 1994. p 50.

"In 1650, a debris avalanche occurred on the northern slopes of the Chaos Crags dome on Lassen Peak, forming the extensive and well named zone of dacitic boulders, scraps and ash, called Chaos Jumbles." Scarth, Alwyn. Volcanoes : An Introduction. London, UK: CRC Press, 1994. p 61. L Hamm 17:16, 21 August 2005 (UTC)

I've added in a reference to a single fatality during the eruption. I don't know if it was officially reported at the time, however, it was recorded in the hotel register in Prattville; the original register is on display at the Chester Museum, where the notation dealing with that death is written in (the hotel's owner kept a running, day-to-day account of the eruptions in the register). I don't recall if a name was given, I'll check in the next few days.Kmmontandon 23:53, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Move to official name?
The official name of this peak is Lassen Peak, see USGS Board on Geographic Names on Lassen Peak. I propose that the page be moved to that name and this turned into a redirect. Comments? -- Spireguy 02:37, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

OK, I should have looked at the history first. Why was this moved away from the name Lassen Peak? I believe that "Mount Lassen" is used, as supported by the variants list on the USGS BGN page, and by a Google check. But it is not overwhelmingly more popular, and it is not the name used in most serious references. And most important, it is not the official name. Certainly "Mt. Lassen" is inappropriate since it is not MOS; "Mount Lassen" would be prefered. But I strongly suggest moving back to the official name. Again, comments? -- Spireguy 02:52, 2 October 2006 (UTC)
 * I live in the area of this mountain..just a 35 minute drive, and it is always called Mount Lassen. Wikipedia says we should use the common name and Mt. Lassen is more used than Lassen Peak. Now, I did make a mistake when moving as I didn't know other mountains were named with "Mount" and not the abbreviated "Mt.". Can somebody help me move it to "Mount Lassen"?
 * —Preceding unsigned comment added by Something14 (talk • contribs) 1:23, October 3, 2006
 * Thanks for the info. However I think there is still a real question here. I believe your evidence that "Mount Lassen" is the most common local name of the mountain, where "local" means people who live nearby. However that does not make it necessarily the most common name of the mountain among all English speakers. (In looking at the intent of the relevant guideline, I think that is what is key, but I could be wrong.) In fact, I would say that easily the more common name among all English speakers (or even all Americans) is Lassen Peak. It is the name that is more commonly used in published literature about the mountain (by a large factor, AFAIK), so this is how most Americans know it. Added to that is the fact that it is the official name, which I do think counts for something.
 * An example: suppose that everyone living near a mountain calls it by a local nickname, but visitors from elsewhere, guidebooks, state and federal descriptions, all call it by a different name. Using the local nickname as the article title would be inappropriate, since the vast majority of people looking at Wikipedia would not be familiar with that name. I don't want to disparage the "Mount Lassen" appellation as just a nickname, but it seems to me to be a similar case. However, I admit it does seem strange in some ways not to use a common local name.
 * I would suggest waiting a few days to see if there is more input on this question before doing any more moving around, to avoid unnecessary edits/reverts. -- Spireguy 02:32, 3 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Hi there. If you want to go by Google hits, "Mount Lassen" gets 51,000, while "Lassen Peak" gets 103,000. The National Park Service and the USGS Cascade Volcano Observatory  both call it Lassen Peak. Thus my opinion is that the article should be named "Lassen Peak". Certainly not "Mt. Lassen". If it stays here, it definitely needs to be changed to "Mount Lassen". Have  you thought about asking on the WP:NAME talk page? Katr67 03:03, 3 October 2006 (UTC)


 * OK, I went ahead and moved it (sorry, Spireguy). There's clear Wikipedia precedence for using the USGS official name when the local name and the official name are both equally common (see, e.g., the reasoning and discussion at Talk:Mount Katahdin). Yes, this annoys locals. (I personally never call it "Lassen Peak", always "Mount Lassen"), but the guidelines are clear. hike395 03:59, 4 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Looks like the guidelines are in flux -- it was clear back in March 2005, but double-checking found that the guidelines at Naming conventions (geographic names) are under debate (sigh). The old guidelines directed us to look at online encyclopedias (Encarta uses "Lassen Peak", Columbia Encyclopedia uses "Lassen Peak", Encyclopedia Britannica uses "Lassen Peak"). This is pretty clear, and given that the official name is also "Lassen Peak", there isn't much room for debate.


 * Again, this is annoying to those of us who like to use "Mount Lassen", but given the precedent at Mount Katahdin (and West Maui Mountains), that's just what WP does. hike395 04:11, 4 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Given that the official name is Lassen Peak according to the USGS, I would definitely lean towards using that name. Do any of the standard topo maps show Mount Lassen or do they all show Lassen Peak? It is really a peak or a mountain (based on prominence criteria)? Never been to the peak so I don't have any direct knowledge of the mountain itself. RedWolf 01:35, 5 October 2006 (UTC)


 * All of the three scales of USGS map use "Lassen Peak"--I checked. I don't think there is any size distinction (using prominence or other measure of size) between a "peak" and a "mountain." It's usually just a linguistic preference. But I agree with moving it back to "Lassen Peak." --Spireguy 01:43, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Another data discrepancy: snowfall level?
The paragraph 'physical geography' begins "Lassen Peak has the highest known winter snowfall amounts in California. There is an average annual snowfall of 660 in (1,676 cm), and in some years, more than 1,000 in (2,500 cm) of snow falls at its base elevation of 8,250 ft (2,515 m) at Lake Helen." There seem to be discrepancies and improperly sourced data here.

The NPS reports that Lassen receives on the order of 250" inches of snow, which is corroborated by the CA department of water resources list of snow pack totals from 1930 to the present (see sources just below.) Note that in the snowpack list, the annual total is *not* the sum of the monthly snowpack numbers; the numbers are cumulative / represent the snow's increasing accumulation during the course of the year (with an occasional flatline of not accumulating steadily into spring, or a lower number come April). https://www.nps.gov/lavo/learn/nature/snowpack.htm http://cdec.water.ca.gov/cgi-progs/snowQuery?course_num=47&month=%28All%29&start_date=&end_date=&data_wish=Retrieve+Data

Could this information have been sourced by mistake from another location somewhere else in the Cascades? I'm aware that more than 1000 inches of snow has fallen in at least one place in Washington state, but that level has never been measured in California to my knowledge. Also, it's popularly known that the Mammoth area receives the highest amount of snowfall in big winters, and I've never heard of Lassen matching the 500" or 600" inches that has been measured at the former. Finally, there are certainly other places named Lake Helen or Helen Lake that could be the cause of a mix-up.

It's unclear whether the measurement currently cited in this wikipedia article has a legitimate origin, or whether this was a mistake in wikipedia that has been re-stated elsewhere on the internet. This article may be an example of such a circular mistake: https://www.sierrasun.com/opinion/weather-window-the-snowiest-spot-in-california-is-lake-helen-near-lassen-volcanic-national-park/

If so, it means that these other sources should not be used as primary sources for this "Lassen Peak" article, because it's possible that they tautologically refer back to the original mistake.

See also: https://water.ca.gov/Programs/Flood-Management/Flood-Data/Snow-Surveys https://www.nrcs.usda.gov/wps/portal/nrcs/main/ca/snow/ https://www.facebook.com/LassenNPS/posts/lassen-has-the-highest-snow-level-in-all-of-california-right-now-on-february-28-/1534887173211388/

Edit: There are similar unsourced statements in the article https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lassen_Volcanic_National_Park; also the slightly more narrow claim that Lassen has more snowfall than any other volcano in the cascades - this is very unlikely when comparing to examples in WA state. However, there are also sourced statements placing snowfall levels between 150-650 inches in various places on the mountain.

Xoxua (talk) 22:15, 29 April 2019 (UTC)xoxua

Data Descrepancies -- Need to Confirm/Rectify
I noticed two discrepancies in the data.

First, the USGS topographic quadrangles (and the Lassen Volcanic National Park map) all list the Lassen Peak summit at elevation 10,457 feet (3187 meters), not elevation 10,462 feet as stated in the facts table on the Mount Lassen page.

Second, the general description for Mount Lassen (above the “contents” list) states:

“It was created on the destroyed northeastern flank of now gone Mount Tehama, a stratovolcano that was at least a thousand feet (300 m) higher than Lassen.”

The Wikipedia entry for Mount Tehama (above the “contents” list) states:

“At its peak, it would have reached approximately 3,350 meters (10,991 feet) high, with a diameter at the base of approximately 12 kilometers.”

The elevation cited for Mount Tehama would therefore be around 500 feet higher than the Lassen Peak, not the one thousand feet cited in the Mount Lassen entry.

Anyone care to confirm and clarify/rectify these issues?

Encouragement 22:56, 3 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Regarding your first point, the data in the USGS map is in the out-of-date reference frame from 1927, while the data in the infobox is from the National Geodetic Survey (http://www.ngs.noaa.gov) and is in the latest vertical reference frame, dated 1988. Please see Mount Whitney for more details about this, but the infobox contains the most up-to-date elevation.


 * I don't know anything about the second point hike395 04:26, 4 November 2006 (UTC)

Large picture
Do we really need such a large picture? -- Spireguy 13:00, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

Reverts & Undos
Just a reminder when reverting or undoing non-constructive edits, please chack that the version you are reverting to is good as well. --Burntnickel (talk) 18:27, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

B. F. Loomis
The book Volcanoes in America's National Parks (by R & B Decker; ISBN 978-962-217-677-5) states that a person by the name of B.F. Loomis, along with some Congressman, got the National Park established and took many pictures of Lassen during its 1914 eruption. Could anyone with info put it under the section Human History? -- Guan long   wucaii  15:49, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

World Map?
could we possibly have a world map with the volcano pinpointed on it? it would help to give a much better sense of the geography —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.159.255.241 (talk) 06:27, 4 October 2010 (UTC)

Question
What is the meaning of the statement "The two older craters were buried"? It does not appear in the reference (Eruptions of Lassen Peak, California, 1914 to 1917) that the article cite. Avihu (talk) 07:43, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

External links modified
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Pronunciation?
I've heard two different pronunciations for this mountain:  "LASS-ən" and  "LAY-sən". Considering one or both pronunciations may've been random guesses by people reading from text, I have no idea which of them is considered correct, and this article provides no pronunciation guide. - Gilgamesh (talk) 20:34, 12 December 2022 (UTC)
 * I found the answer. Unsourced for now, but that was part of the problem to begin with. - Gilgamesh (talk) 17:21, 16 December 2022 (UTC)
 * --- found source — hike395 (talk) 04:44, 17 December 2022 (UTC)
 * Thank you. - Gilgamesh (talk) 14:41, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

Larsen peak change
How will lassen peak change overtime 2603:8080:B600:492B:AC08:BD:772:56F (talk) 23:44, 23 January 2023 (UTC)