Talk:Lassen Peak

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For Google: Devastated Area

[edit] 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)

[edit] 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"?
• —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Something14 (talk • contribs) 1:23, October 3, 2006 (UTC)

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 [1] and the USGS Cascade Volcano Observatory [2] 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 Wikipedia: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)

[edit] 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)