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Mammoth Is Interesting

A monument memorializing the three Mammoth Ski Patrollers who died in a horrific April 2006 accident will be dedicated in a public ceremony on the morning of Saturday, Aug. 25, at the top of Mammoth Mountain.

Mammoth artist Larry Walker's stone monument, in memory of Walter Rosenthal, James Juarez and John Scott McAndrews, will be placed at the summit, with a 360-dgreee views of the Sierra and surrounding area.

The public is invited to attend the monument dedication ceremony at 8 a.m., according to a spokesperson for Mammoth Mountain Ski Area. People are asked to RSVP at mammothmountain.com/dedication .

Gondola transportation to the site will begin at 7:30 a.m. to allow time for the ride to the top and the walk to the site, situated at skier's left of the gondola building above Hangman's Hollow ski run. The walk is rugged, and will take about five minutes each way.

The monument was made possible due to donations by many people, including those who purchased lift tickets on Friday, April 14th, 2006, when all ticket sale proceeds were donated to the Ski Patrol Memorial Fund.

The monument was designed by Walker with input from Mammoth Mountain Ski Area Staff, Ski Patrol, the families and friends of the fallen patrollers and many others.

The three patrollers died April 6, 2006, when they fell 21 feet into a volcanic fumarole in a "snow collapse" near Chair 3/Facelift.

Seven other ski patrollers were injured as the result of inhalation of dangerous gases and were taken to Mammoth Hospital.

According to various accounts, McAndrews and Juarez were trying to reconfigure fencing around the well-known fumarole area, which was buried under recent snow. Apparently unknown to the patrollers, the fumarole, which spews steam, had created a cavern underneath them, filled with deadly gases.

The fumarole itself is a small slit on the rocky surface of Mammoth Mountain.

As the two patrollers were manipulating the fence, they dropped through the roof of the snow cavern.

Rosenthal, a member of the patrol since 1972, reportedly saw the two patrollers drop through and attempted a rescue and died in the process. Another ski patroller tried to lower himself into the abyss by rope but was overcome by gases. He was pulled from the 12-foot-wide cavern by other patrollers who quickly responded to the crisis.

Rosenthal worked at the Sierra Nevada Aquatic Research Laboratory (SNARL) in Mammoth Lakes and was an expert in snow hydrology and remote sensing of snow. SNARL is part of the University of California, Santa Barbara.

Rosenthal was the head avalanche forecaster for the mountain, according to SNARL director Dan Dawson.

"Walter also had a long affiliation with UCSB and SNARL," Dawson wrote in an e-mail that was widely distributed. "He was an expert in the mathematical algorithms used to process satellite imagery of the earth's surface, particularly that of snow covered areas."

Rosenthal was also president of the Eastern Sierra Avalanche Center, said Allan Pietrasanta, a director of the organization. Pietrasanta said Rosenthal and others started the avalanche center in the winter of 2004-05 to release information about snow stability and "increase the public's awareness of snowpack stability."

The fumarole area is one of the more distinctive areas on Mammoth Mountain and frequently is called "the stink hole."

According to David Hill, the United States Geological Survey's scientist in charge of the Long Valley region, the fumarole has long been recognized and has not changed its behavior over time.

It existed before the 1989 Mammoth Mountain earthquake swarm and the onset of diffuse CO2 "degassing" responsible for the Horseshoe Lake tree-kill area.

The hazard develops during the winter months when snow builds up over the vent, with the hot gases (80 deg. C or 180 deg F) melting the snow, forming a pit in the snow -- or snow cave, in deep snow conditions.

The dominant gas emitted from the fumarole, aside from water vapor, is carbon dioxide, with an average flux of six tons a day.

Mammoth Mountain is a cumulo-volcano of multiple overlapping lava domes and flows that last erupted 50,000 years ago. There was a small steam explosion 600 years ago.

According to the online encyclopedia Wikipedia, a fumarole (Latin fumus, smoke) is an opening in Earth's crust, often in the neighborhood of volcanoes, which emits steam and gases such as carbon dioxide, sulfur dioxide, hydrochloric acid, and hydrogen sulfide.

Fumaroles may occur along tiny cracks or long fissures, in chaotic clusters or fields, and on the surfaces of lava flows and thick deposits of pyroclastic flows. A fumarole field is an area of thermal springs and gas vents where magma or hot igneous rocks at shallow depth are releasing gases or interacting with groundwater.

From the perspective of groundwater, fumaroles could be described as a hot spring that boils off all its water before the water reaches the surface.