Starbuck via Hammer Grade

Plenty of December sunshine Sunday as I took a drive (and a few short hikes) to explore several Ice Age Flood features along the Snake River.

I'd been wanting to check out the streamlined Palouse hills near Hammer Grade Road (Cheney-Palouse Scabland Tract) and had also been interested in visiting a viewpoint along the Little Goose Dam Road (South of river). Dam crossings are not allowed on weekends so ... I ended up driving to the gate on the north end of Little Goose Dam and then backtracking to Washtucna Coulee, then south and around to Starbuck. Not a problem, I like it out there.

Before I get to the trip photos, let me add one taken last Thursday. Teresa and I made a trip to Ellensburg to attend the Ellensburg IAFI meeting [Speaker: Richard Waitt USGS]. I wish I could make it up to more of their meetings. Nick and Karl do a great job.

On the way, we made a quick stop south of Sentinel Gap to view huge field of boulders that settled out as floodwater entered the Pasco Basin.

[Click any image to enlarge]

Teresa and erratic boulder near Mattawa, WA. Sentinel Gap in the distance.

Back to Sunday's trip.

Pretty good variety Sunday. Lots of streamlined Palouse hills, gravel bars and a quiet hike to the bottom of the Palouse River Canyon.


Early morning along Hammer Grade Road. This area was once covered with rolling loess hills up to 250 feet thick. In major channels the Ice Age Floods removed huge amounts of loess (windblown silt), exposing the basalt bedrock. Many loess islands were left behind (like the one pictured above).

"Here are streamlined, prow-pointed and steeply scarped loessial islands 150 feet high" J Harlen Bretz

Wheat is grown for miles to the left of image. A ten mile wide flood tract exists to the right. [View South]

1. Hammer Grade Road.
2. Wheat field.
3. Scarped Palouse hill.
4. Streamline Palouse hill.


View North
Same thing here. Flood-swept basalt and streamlined hills to west. Wheat country on the right.


Hammer Grade is no problem when bare. Might want to think twice before attempting to descend through snow and ice.


Flood-swept scabland and scarped Palouse hills. If you want to search for the missing soil ... Try looking in the Willamette Valley and Pacific Ocean.

Two photos below from Bruce Bjornstad

I sure like these shots. I'm impressed the farmer has maximized his wheat acreage by farming a loess island!


Surrounded by scabland.

Flood-cut channel through Palouse hills.
Large deer population along Hammer Grade.

Once you get to the bottom of Hammer Grade (near the Snake River), start looking for depositional features left by the Ice Age Floods.

[Hammer length: 10.5 inches]


Exposed flood deposits near Little Goose Dam (Snake River). Note band of fine material that settled out during slackwater conditions. I'll add a few photos below that show similar slackwater band(s) exposed downstream at Lake Sacajawea Bar. Road in distance climbs to top of Little Goose Dam. Recreation area marked with "1".

Call 1-888-DAMINFO (1-888-326-4636) for Dam Crossing Info.

Little Goose Dam - Army CE Photo
Red arrow marks exposed flood deposits shown in previous image.



Hammer Grade structure.
Hammer Grade warning sign has been rotated and bolted.

Chief Washtucna watches over the coulee.

Photo by Steve Coffel (Florence, MT)

Steve recently sent me a few Snake River photos that led me to the Little Goose Dam Road overlook. I like the soft lighting in this one along with the cool fence!

Thanks again Steve and I hope we can get out for a hike next spring!


Map shows lower Hammer Grade Road, Old Vantage Bridge (Moved from Vantage area when Wanapum Dam built) and Starbuck, WA. The Old Vantage Bridge crosses the Snake River just below Palouse and Snake confluence.

Starbuck now has two restaurants.


Little Goose Dam at top left. Interesting flood deposits are found along SR-261 near Starbuck. Steve's overlook is marked with camera symbol.

View downstream from overlook.
1. Huge flood bar. I'm trying to find a name for it.
2. Mid-Canyon Bar (J Harlen Bretz described this feature in 1928).
3. Mouth of Palouse River Canyon (right).

Bruce Bjornstad describes the Mid-Canyon Bar in his book On the Trail of the Ice Age Floods.

"Floodwaters rushing down the Palouse River cataract canyon plowed into the high walls of the Snake River valley, forcing the water to split and rush in opposite directions. Some floodwaters surged up the Snake River for 80 miles, all the way to Lewiston, Idaho, and beyond. The rest of the floodwater went down the Snake River, eventually emptying into the Pasco Basin."

View east from overlook. Looks like the pit is active.

The Mid-Canyon Bar is 2.5 miles long. A tremendous amount of gravel has been removed from bar below the mid-Canyon Bar (note the giant current ripples that are about to disappear).


- WSDOT - Photo
Little Goose Dam Airport was built on a Snake River bar. The water behind Little Goose Dam (Lake Bryan - Max. pool 646.5 feet) covers much of the bar.


YouTube video uploaded by fazonsazar on Sep 8, 2007. Video shows Cessna 172 landing at Little Goose Dam and Lock on a windy afternoon in late August.


Please scroll back up about six images (Google Earth) and check out the Tucannon drainage. Huge volumes of sediment laden floodwater surged into this valley during Ice Age Flood events.

Ya gotta feel sorry for the beavers living on this stretch of river 15,000 years ago. Feeling safe living off the main Snake channel ... Then suddenly forced to ride out a 700 foot deep flood surge that came from a downstream direction!


Tucannon Valley - View west from Little Goose Dam Road (on the way to the overlook). FYI- There isn't an official "Overlook". Just pull over when Snake River is in view.


At least six rhythmites are visible at the Starbuck exposure. Approximatly 25 have been found in the Tucannon Valley.


Bruce Bjornstad explains that the coarse basaltic gravel between some of the beds may be material shed off the steep valley walls between floods.


Use caution if you visit this area on foot. Motorists are dealing with curves and elevation changes ... probably not expecting pedestrians.


The last time I visited this location, a woman stopped to ask "Are you OK?". I don't think she had much of an appreciation for the flood feature I'd driven many miles to examine.


Ice Age Flood rhythmites and Columbia River Basalt. I'm standing too close!!! Good thing Skye Cooley thought enough to back up and capture a panoramic view of this exposure. See below.


Thanks to Skye for letting me use this amazing shot of Starbuck rhythmites draped over Columbia River Basalt. (Click to enlarge)

Check out some great shots at Skye's: Picasa Clastic Dikes Gallery.


Now I'm on the south side of the Snake River - Looking at the first flood deposits shown above. The exposure between Hammer Grade and Little Goose Dam. You can see the slackwater band.


Here's a shot of a similar slackwater band exposed downstream on the 400' tall Lake Sacajawea Bar.

A few images here from a visit to the Lake Sacajawea Bar earlier this year. The size of many Snake River gravel bars is impressive. Hard to image what happened along the Snake River between Pasco and Lewiston at the end of the last Ice Age. Usually the floodwaters raced down the Snake and into the Pasco Basin. Other times when Wallula Gap restricted the flow, floodwater rushed up the Snake River. During several intervals, the flow stabalized and fine material was allowed to settle out to form the slackwater bands we see today.

Red arrow points to Walker Bar.


Walker Bar borrow pit.


Still looking at Lake Sacajawea Bar flood deposits.


The drastic material change is cool. Some of these contacts are super sharp.


Bruce Bjornstad has placed an interesting Geocache near this location.


Railroad spike for scale.

"The gravel pit excavated by the railroad here has a scarp 200 feet high. The gravel is unindurated and slides easily, so that the structure is difficult to decipher. But it is 99 per cent basalt." - J Harlen Bretz 1925

The streamlined hill shapes are often referred to as teardrop, ship-like or airfoil-like. Earlier this year I attended an Ellensburg IAFI chapter meeting and heard Vic Baker compare them to "A trout in a stream". I like that one.

Several excellent examples of streamlined Palouse Hills are visible from the intersection of SR-261 and the entrance road to Palouse Falls State Park.

"These hills consist of "islands" of loess that appear to float in a sea of basalt scabland. Their teardrop shape consists of a prominant steep prow on the upstream end and long tapered tails on the downstream end. This shape, which was repeated over and over again in the formation of streamlined sedimentary hills, is not a coincidence. During Ice Age flooding, the hills were streamlined so their length was usually about three times longer than their width; this hydrodynamic shape provided the least amount of drag to the floodwaters that formed them. - Bjornstad"

NASA has some impressive shots of streamlined hills on Mars. Scientist estimate flood volumes on Mars were 10 times the largest Missoula flood.


SR-261 near the entrance to Palouse Falls State Park - The scarped Palouse hills aren't too far off the highway.



Teresa and I were in Washington, DC the week of Thanksgiving - I noticed this Palouse River Canyon USGS photo in the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History.

Cool! Franklin County in the Smithsonian.

- Palouse Falls -

Link to 2009 hike in this area.

Nice day. Too much driving and not enough hiking but still fun!

Merry Christmas! Tom


Glacial Lake Missoula floodwaters were responsible for most of the features pictured above; However, another large flood swept through this stretch of the Snake River about 17,400 years ago. Click video above to watch Nick Zentner interview USGS Geologist Jim O'Connor. Jim talks about the Lake Bonneville Flood at the 14 minute mark of interview.

Watch Nick interview other guests from the US Geological Survey and various regional organizations at Central Rocks.
"Central Rocks" aims to promote an appreciation and understanding of Washington geology - while also shedding light on research and teaching of CWU faculty.

Palouse Falls and Palouse River Canyon - Whitman County Side

Hikers enjoy lunch break at Palouse Falls.

The Ice Age Floods from Glacial Lake Missoula and other sources carved the Palouse River canyon and created spectacular Palouse Falls.

I felt fortunate to be allowed to join a group of six other Ice Age Floods enthusiasts on a hike along the east rim of the Palouse River Canyon. The area is privately owned and has been maintained in a pristine condition by a family that obviously appreciates this unique and spectacular landscape.

Lloyd Stoess organized the hike and arranged for our entry with the landowner. I can't thank him enough for letting me tag along. The arrow-straight upper channel of the Palouse River Canyon and Winn Lake Canyon are Ice Age Floods features I've always wanted to view.

- Click any image to expand -

Our hike began in the rolling Palouse hills several miles east of the canyon. These windblown loess deposits on top of the basalt, have accumulated at depths up to 250 feet. This image was taken near the margin of a huge channel swept by the Ice Age Floods.

Wheat farming ends where the floods stripped away the soil. Mounds shown beyond the wheat are Streamlined Palouse hills that withstood the floodwaters. These large mounds are erosional remnants of Palouse hills.

Another Streamlined Palouse hill along our route. Note exposed basalt bedrock between fence and loess island.

I found the quote below in geologist Bruce Bjornstad's book "On the Trail of the Ice Age Floods":

"The 'islands' of loess which make striking features on many broad scabland tracts are almost invariably elongated with the gradiant of the tract and are almost invariably scarped on the sides and upgradient end ... Many such hills or hill groups are separated by narrow scabland channels. Some stand alone in the scabland, miles from others of their kind."

J Harlen Bretz (1928)

View east - back to the wheat fields.
In early October, Findley Lake looks better on the GPS and maps than it does in person.

1. Findley Lake


2. Animal trail to seasonal water


3. Scabland


4. Palouse hills east of channel

Google Map terrain view shows one of the Streamlined Palouse hills in the area. Use mouse to navigate map.


Lloyd leads the group through several miles of scabland on our way to the Palouse River Canyon.


I shot a few short videos during the hike. Click arrow to play. Sorry I'm not very steady with the camera. The tripod was home in closet.


Amazing place when you try to visualize the floodwaters that created these features.


The floods scoured out many depressions in the channel that today serve as seasonal water sources for livestock and wildlife.


Google Earth view of the upper Palouse River Canyon. Note deep tectonic fractures in the area that were eroded and scoured out by the Ice Age Floods. The view in this image is to the north ... Arrow marks Palouse Falls ... Washtucna Coulee runs east to west at top. During some Ice Age Flood events, Washtucna Coulee was too small to carry the floodwater. When the torrent overtopped the coulee rim, it flowed south to the Snake River carving the Palouse River Canyon.


Another Google Earth image. View looking south from Washtucna Coulee. The straight 4.5 mile trench in the upper canyon sure is facinating.


View from canyon rim looking north - Up the 4.5 mile trench.


Railroad bridge in upper canyon.


Union Pacific equipment on west side of canyon. Bruce Bjornstad hiking along east rim.


Geologists Bruce Bjornstad and Gene Kiver patiently answered our questions about Columbia River Basalt and the Ice Age Floods.


Laminated deposits on the right confused me. I was behind the group when I noticed these.


View of Palouse Falls State Park viewpoint from behind falls.


Here's a shot for Tyler Bradt in case he finds this page. The flow on the day of our hike was much lower than it was when he made his 186-foot kayak drop off the falls to set a world record earlier this year. Link at bottom of this page to interview where Tyler describes his thoughts as he went over the edge.


Not the best lighting with half the falls in shadow.


View across canyon to Palouse Falls State Park viewpoint. I'm standing in line with a fracture in the basalt that's been scoured out by the floods (large cracks on both east and west rim of canyon line up).

The terraced inner-canyon is pretty amazing. The Palouse River Canyon and nearby Devil's Canyon are good locations to examine Columbia River Basalt flows.


Canyon resident

South of the falls we found several interesting basalt towers.


Hikers stand below group of columns that withstood the floodwaters.

Lone column along canyon rim.

Winn Lake Canyon is an incredible Ice Age Floods feature. A classic example of a flood carved coulee. Walking into Winn Lake Canyon was my favorite part of the hike.


Another shot of loess islands in the channel.


Hikers (bottom left) walk around the upstream end of a Streamlined Palouse hill on our way back to the wheat fields.

The glossary in Bjornstad's "On the Trail of the Ice Age Floods" describes loess as:

Windblown silt and fine sand that has collected downwind of sedimentary basins along the floods route, especially in the Palouse country where it accumulated into rolling hills up to 250 feet thick. Loess began forming about the same time as the earliest Ice Age Floods (about 2 million years ago) and continues to form today.

Images below (2) show examples of windblown loess in the Columbia Basin.


Image recorded by NASA on 4 October 2009. Blue circle marks Pasco, WA.
Arrows label Moses Coulee (1), Grand Coulee (2), Telford-Crab Creek (3) and Cheney-Palouse (4) Ice Age Flood tracts that are well defined in this high altitude image.

NASA TEXT: Visibility dropped to zero in parts of eastern Washington on October 4, 2009, as a large dust storm blew through. This image of the storm was captured by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite shortly after noon (Pacific Daylight Time). According to local news, the storm brought strong winds gusting to 43 miles per hour in places that propelled the dust across the southeast corner of the state. After numerous multi-vehicle accidents, sections of Interstate 90 near the town of Moses Lake and several local roads had to be closed for several hours.
The dust storm persisted for several hours and was still visible when Aqua MODIS flew over the region at 2:00 p.m. local time. The Terra MODIS image shown here is available in multiple resolutions from the MODIS Rapid Response System.

Open large 7 mb NASA Image of dust storm.


Dust Devil


GPS track shows 14 mile hike route. Thanks again Lloyd!!!


At least I know where Hooper is.


These two patrol the streets of Hooper. Bruce has a story about the big one.


The fractures are pretty distinct in this Google Map terrain view. About five clicks of the "Right" arrow will shift view to the Streamlined Palouse hills shown in several images above.


One more look over the lip of Palouse Falls. I'm so impressed with Tyler Bradt's trip over the falls! Link to Tyler Bradt interview below.

Click above to play interview with Tyler Bradt that describes his world record kayak drop over Palouse Falls.

Link to images and photos of Palouse Falls in winter.

Link to images and photos of Palouse Falls near flood stage.

Link to USGS Palouse River flow at Hooper.