High Sierra Topix

Los Angeles AP:

A new NASA study says loss of water from rocks during drought caused California's Sierra Nevada to rise nearly an inch (24 millimeters) in height from October 2011 to October 2015.

The study also found that in the following two years of increased snow and rain, the rocks in the range regained about half as much water as was lost during the drought and the height of the mountains has fallen about half an inch (12 millimeters).

Research leader Donald Argus of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory is discussing the study Wednesday at an American Geophysical Union conference in New Orleans.

The study suggests significantly more water was lost from cracks and soil within fractured mountain rock during drought and gained during heavy precipitation than hydrology models show.

That's pretty interesting, thanks.

Plate tectonics is also lifting the range. The Appalachians were once higher than the current Rockies. It is projected that one day in the distant future, the Sierra will be higher than the Himalayas are today.

I have my doubts that any humans will be here to enjoy that Sierra.

Tom_H wrote:Plate tectonics is also lifting the range. The Appalachians were once higher than the current Rockies. It is projected that one day in the distant future, the Sierra will be higher than the Himalayas are today.I have my doubts that any humans will be here to enjoy that Sierra.

There is a small amount of tectonic uplift ongoing with the Sierra Nevada today. This is one of my main areas of research (over longer time periods of several million years) and I was recently in Reno discussing the data on very recent (ie last few years) uplift with one of the main researchers on this topic. The bottom line is that there is some debate on the rate of ongoing tectonic uplift, but for those researchers whose research indicates recent/ongoing uplift the rates are very much less than the Himalaya and the tectonic scenario is very different for the Sierra Nevada compared to the Himalaya. Accordingly it is highly unlikely the Sierra Nevada will surpass the Himalaya in elevation. In contrast, the Appalachians may have stood as tall as the Himalaya many millions of years ago.