Kodiak and back

Hi All,
We are out of the internet cone of silence and are currently in Seward Alaska - named after William H. Seward (Union Alum, and Secretary of State for President Lincoln, and the individual responsible for purchasing Alaska from Russia in 1867). Below are the student blogs from our adventures on Kodiak, as well as a few photos. I have also updated the Kenai Peninsula blog with photos from those days.

Thanks for all the comments - they are super! We are heading to Whittier tomorrow to catch a ferry to Cordova. The cell coverage will be extremely limited while we are in the eastern part of Prince William Sound, which is great because part of the richness of this experience is getting the students to unplug.

Enjoy the stories and photos, the next update will be in about a week from Valdez! Wish for sunny weather and no snow!!

Amanda
Our Kodiak Island trip was awesome! We saw lots of geology that is specific to Kodiak Island. One of our first projects was on Chiniak Cape, which is the most south-eastern point on Kodiak. This cape is also the western limit of the Sitka Spruce trees. Back in 1964 after the massive earthquake, a train of 30-40 foot tsunami waves devastated this area. We cored 4 Sitka Spruce trees that we hoped had been disrupted by the earthquake and tsunami. Dendrochronology (tree ring analysis) can give us insight into growing patterns of trees by looking at the size and color of the rings from the tree core. As it turned out, after coring, gluing, and sanding our tree cores, the trees had not been alive for the 1964 earthquake—we could only count back to 1971, so we did not observe any disturbances from the natural disasters this area experienced. I will be coring trees on the Denali Fault for my senior thesis research project, so although we did not get the results we had hoped; it was still beneficial to have learned how to core trees. Our campsite was in a perfect location—right next to a river! I have yet to catch my first fish, but we still have two more weeks. The only disappointment about Kodiak was that we did not see any Kodiak Grizzly Bears, but we did see a few arctic foxes, and got up-close and personal shots of Bald Eagles by the river. We also came across some very interesting characters, including Kevin (#10, the Quarterback of the Kodiak High School Football team), the 'friendly local' with a 3 foot long beard, and Cecil the gnome. We are on our way to do some grocery shopping and then off to Exit Glacier tonight!

This is Alex and her gnome Cecil. Cecil spent a couple days with us at camp as he is a local and was quite helpful around the campfire.

Kaitlin – Kodiak Island was a great start to our trip! Our campsite was on Pasagshak Bay, Southeast of Kodiak City, and a beautiful site! We were camped about 25 feet from the river, which made for some great fishing! Using the red salmon and dolly varden caught, we made salmon fajitas for dinner. Our first full day on the island we went to Narrow Cape, where the Alaska Aerospace Development Corporation has built and operates a launch complex. Besides the wide-open and remote launch corridor, an unobstructed down-range flight path, and its low cost of operation, this complex is ultimately located on an active fault. A fault is determined to be active if it has moved significantly in the last 10,000 years or less, and it is estimated to have moved within the last 1000 years. It is estimated that the next movement could happen anytime in the next 100-300 years, which poses a great problem for the complex. If a quake were to occur, it could be as large as a 7.0 Richter magnitude earthquake, which would cause significant damage. The earthquake that occurred in 1964 was a 9.2, one of the largest to occur in North America. The launchings also concern environmentalists about its effect on bears and whales. On our drive to Narrow Cape, we saw some buffalo, which made for a great photo opportunity! Kodiak Island was a great adventure, although its too bad the Kodiak Grizzly Bears were nowhere to be found!

Shannon – While on location at Narrow Cape in Kodiak, we stopped at a beach to observe some stratigraphic sedimentary layers on the coast. We were able to observe several sedimentary layers from different geological time periods. The bedrock was a melange that was part of the Ghostrock Formation of the Eocene. The layer on top of the Ghostrock was sandstone indicative of the Narrow Cape Formation. This sandstone was formed in the Miocene. A layer of glacial till from the Quaternary followed. These three layers of sediment were separated by angular unconformities. Each surface represented a time change and difference in deposition. Deposited over these layers was a strip of fill and Katmai Ash. This ash from the 1912 Novarupta eruption was seen at just about every location we visited, blanketing the surface. This was our first stratigraphy project, and there are several more to follow. All in all, Kodiak was a great time despite the cold weather and sporadic rain showers. We have really been enjoying ourselves by fishing and hanging around the campfire. We have seen a significant amount of wildlife in comparison to what I have seen back home. The eagles fly around everywhere and Jon and I were within twenty yards of some Harbour Seals one day while fishing. The eagles and seal are pretty amazing; however, I hate to say it but I was pretty disappointed in the lack of bears I saw. I didn’t see a single Kodiak grizzly bear. What a shame. Cordova and Denali better have more in store as far as wildlife is concerned because I have to see a bear before I leave. Haha.

Lenny – Mapping tsunami deposits in Middle bay on Kodiak was one of the most interesting experiences I had on Kodiak. After I dug all of the test holes for the group we began to observe the stratigraphic layers. The first main layer we were concerned with was a white Katmai ash which was deposited in a 1912 eruption of Novarupta. From this layer we knew everything above it had to have been deposited after 1912. Above the ash we saw layers of peat and dark grey sand. We were able to determine that the dark grey sand was deposited during the 1964 tsunami generated by the 1964 earthquake which decimated many areas on the island. We moved from the ocean side of the bay to the inland part, taking into account the thickness of the tsunami deposited sand at each site. We were able to determine the extent of the energy from the several waves during the 1964 tsunami in different areas in Middle bay. The deposits were near 20 centimetres thick in the front of the estuary and tapered off near the back, because the tsunami waves were only able to push sediment so far inland. Back at our camp near Pasagshak Bay we all had a great time fishing on the stream which was 30 feet from my tent. I was able to catch a few small sculpin which I threw back into the stream. Joe and Gaver caught some salmon and we were lucky enough to get to cook Joe’s up for dinner, which was delicious. Hopefully we catch some more fish in Cordova.

Joe – Thus far the trip has been great. The awesome geology paired with wonderful weather have afforded us excellent accessibility to the outcrops. We had a little rain on our fourth day, the 24^th of June as we were studying the Middle Bay tsunami deposits, and Kalsin Bay co-seismic beach berm shifts. Kalsin Bay was the bay that had the most fatalities in the 1964 tsunami that slammed into Kodiak. One of the reasons there were nine people killed during the tsunami in Kalsin Bay is due to the fact that the bay opens up to the northeast. There are two other bays, Women’s Bay and Middle Bay orientated in the same direction which also received large run up with little fatalities. The largest of the tsunami waves came into Kalsin Bay around midnight during high tide and had the largest inundation of all the bays. The beach berms in Kalsin Bay are now visible and look like terraces which were formed by co-seismic subsidence of one and a half meters. As the ocean processes deposit new sediments other beach berms are created. With the fascinating geology and history studied so far I would do the wonderful fishing a disservice if I didn’t mention it. I was able to land five Sockeye Salmon on their run up the Pasagshak River to Lake Rose during low tide. The best time to fish for the sockeye Salmon was around 9pm to 11pm and I had the best results with a size 4 purple egg suckling mohair leech. I am looking forward to our next adventure on the southeastern portion of Kenai Peninsula, Exit Glacier and then into the Prince William Sound.

Jon – Just down the road from the Kodiak Launch Complex we stopped at a beach to have lunch and check out the stratigraphy. We saw many different rock formations and sedimentary layers that made this area a complicated one to understand. Several layers stood out as each had the same composition. These layers consisted of sediments with a very light brown color and a small grain size. The sediments, deemed ash, were produced by the Novarupta volcano located in the Katmai area. The most recent eruption occurred in 1912 meaning any new material above highest ash layer has formed since then. This concept was used in Middle Bay in order to understand the 1964 tsunami. The other ash layers represent previous Novarupta eruptions and allow us to create a recurrence interval for this volcano. The camping has been the most fun for me. Hanging around Sam’s campfires and listening to Joe tell a joke, or Kaitlin talking about her “public” school is always a good time. Another memory that stands out is listening to the cattle march by our campsite at 5:30 in the morning. It woke us all up and Lenny swears they walked right through our site. Joe and I, still half-asleep hollered back at the cattle imitating their obnoxious MOOing the best we could. Anything can happen in Alaska!

Samuel – Our last day on Kodiak, June 22, we started a little later than originally scheduled. This occurred because one of our tents broke due to the strong winds of the previous night. The main stop of this day was Fort Abercrombie and the underlying rock. Fort Abercrombie was constructed during WWII by the U.S.A. as a main defensive outpost on the eastern edge of Kodiak Island in Alaska. This fort was mainly for defence against a Japanese attack. There are two different interchanging rock types contained in the Kodiak Formation that underlie this fort. The rock is thought to be cretaceous in age. These rock types are gray sandstone and darker gray shale. Both rock types are thought to be deposited in deep submarine fans. The shale was deposited during times of regular tidal energy, where as the thicker coarser sandstone layers were most likely, rapidly deposited during times of high tidal energy. These particular sandstone layers which are known as turbidites contain ripples, flutes and grooves. Unfortunately Sam ran out of time, and wasn’t able to finish his blog. He will be first for the Cordova recap! Sorry Sam fans!

Other photos from Kodiak!!

On the ferry last night from Kodiak to Homer, some very sunny weather, just after this photo Shannon put on warmer pants...

This is us in Middle Bay, it was a bit wet!



















Kaitlin and Shannon looking off of a horst (uplifted) a sunny day!




















Garver and the Salmon

Below (starting at the top left), group on the horst at Narrow Cape, Joe taking notes at the tree coring site at Cape Chiniak, group checking out shoreline treasures at Fossil Beach (Narrow Cape), Jon on the ferry last night.