Chinook Peak is a mountain summit located in the

Canadian Rockies The Canadian Rockies () or Canadian Rocky Mountains, comprising both the Alberta Rockies and the British Columbian Rockies, is the Canadian segment of the North American Rocky Mountains. It is the easternmost part of the Canadian Cordillera, w ...

Alberta Alberta is a Provinces and territories of Canada, province in Canada. It is a part of Western Canada and is one of the three Canadian Prairies, prairie provinces. Alberta is bordered by British Columbia to its west, Saskatchewan to its east, t ...

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its Provinces and territories of Canada, ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, making it the world's List of coun ...

Description

Chinook Peak is situated 10 kilometers southwest of the town of

Coleman Coleman may refer to: Places Antarctica * Coleman Glacier (Antarctica) * Coleman Peak, Ross Island Canada * Coleman, Alberta * Coleman, Ontario * Coleman, Prince Edward Island United Kingdom * Coleman, Leicester, England United States * C ...

in the

Crowsnest Pass Crowsnest Pass (sometimes referred to as Crow's Nest Pass, ) is a low mountain pass across the Continental Divide of the Canadian Rockies on the Alberta–British Columbia border. Geography The pass is located in southeast British Columbia an ...

area and can be seen from

Highway 3 The following highways are numbered 3, H-3, PRI-3, AH3, E03 and R3. For roads numbered A3, see A3 roads. For roads numbered M3, see M3 (disambiguation)#Roads, M3. For roads numbered N3, see N3 (disambiguation)#Roads, N3. For roads numbered 3A, see ...

, the Crowsnest Highway. It is set on land managed by

Castle Wildland Provincial Park Castle Wildland Provincial Park is a wildland provincial park in southern Alberta, Canada. The designation of the park was established on 20 January 2017, with an effective date of 16 February 2017. The designation involved the protection of o ...

. Precipitation runoff from the mountain drains into tributaries of the nearby

Crowsnest River The Crowsnest River is a tributary to the Oldman River in southern Alberta, southwestern Alberta, Canada. Location From its source in Crowsnest Lake (Alberta), Crowsnest Lake at an elevation of about in the Canadian Rockies, Crowsnest River me ...

Topographic relief Terrain (), alternatively relief or topographical relief, is the dimension and shape of a given surface of land. In physical geography, terrain is the lay of the land. This is usually expressed in terms of the elevation, slope, and orientati ...

is significant as the summit rises 1,300 meters (4,265 feet) above the river in 4.5 kilometers (2.8 miles).

Sentry Mountain Sentry Mountain is a summit located in the Canadian Rockies of Alberta, Canada. Description Sentry Mountain is situated 10 kilometers west-southwest of the town of Coleman in the Crowsnest Pass area and can be seen from Highway 3, the Crowsnes ...

is to the northwest and the nearest higher neighbor is Andy Good Peak, to the southeast on the

Continental Divide A continental divide is a drainage divide on a continent such that the drainage basin on one side of the divide feeds into one ocean or sea, and the basin on the other side either feeds into a different ocean or sea, or else is endorheic, not ...

History

Chinook Peak was named by Jim Kerr, a resident of the Crowsnest Pass. Jim knew that when snow started blowing from the top from the west, a

chinook wind Chinook winds, or simply Chinooks, are two types of prevailing warm, generally westerly winds in western North America: Coastal Chinooks and interior Chinooks. The coastal Chinooks are persistent seasonal, wet, southwesterly winds blowing in from ...

would soon follow. When mapping this area, Dr. Raymond A. Price of the

Geological Survey of Canada The Geological Survey of Canada (GSC; , CGC) is a Canadian federal government agency responsible for performing geological surveys of the country developing Canada's natural resources and protecting the environment. A branch of the Earth Science ...

mapping this area, used this name to identify the peak.Aphrodite Karamitsanis (1991), ''Place Names of Alberta, Vol I: Mountains, mountain parks, and foothills'', University of Calgary Press, , p. 49 The mountain's toponym was officially adopted in 1962 by the

Geographical Names Board of Canada The Geographical Names Board of Canada (GNBC) is a national committee with a secretariat in Natural Resources Canada, part of the Government of Canada, which authorizes the names used and name changes on official federal government maps of Canad ...

Geology

Chinook Peak is composed of

sedimentary rock Sedimentary rocks are types of rock (geology), rock formed by the cementation (geology), cementation of sediments—i.e. particles made of minerals (geological detritus) or organic matter (biological detritus)—that have been accumulated or de ...

laid down during the

Precambrian The Precambrian ( ; or pre-Cambrian, sometimes abbreviated pC, or Cryptozoic) is the earliest part of Earth's history, set before the current Phanerozoic Eon. The Precambrian is so named because it preceded the Cambrian, the first period of t ...

Jurassic The Jurassic ( ) is a Geological period, geologic period and System (stratigraphy), stratigraphic system that spanned from the end of the Triassic Period million years ago (Mya) to the beginning of the Cretaceous Period, approximately 143.1 Mya. ...

periods. Formed in shallow seas, this sedimentary rock was pushed east and over the top of younger

Cretaceous The Cretaceous ( ) is a geological period that lasted from about 143.1 to 66 mya (unit), million years ago (Mya). It is the third and final period of the Mesozoic Era (geology), Era, as well as the longest. At around 77.1 million years, it is the ...

period rock during the

Laramide orogeny The Laramide orogeny was a time period of mountain building in western North America, which started in the Late Cretaceous, 80 to 70 million years ago, and ended 55 to 35 million years ago. The exact duration and ages of beginning and end of the o ...

Climate

Based on the

Köppen climate classification The Köppen climate classification divides Earth climates into five main climate groups, with each group being divided based on patterns of seasonal precipitation and temperature. The five main groups are ''A'' (tropical), ''B'' (arid), ''C'' (te ...

, Chinook Peak has an alpine

subarctic climate The subarctic climate (also called subpolar climate, or boreal climate) is a continental climate with long, cold (often very cold) winters, and short, warm to cool summers. It is found on large landmasses, often away from the moderating effects of ...

with cold, snowy winters, and mild summers. Temperatures can drop below −20 °C with wind chill factors below −30 °C.

Gallery

File:Chinook Peak (Alberta).jpg, Northeast aspect File:Chinook Peak, north.jpg, North aspect File:Chinook Peak in winter.jpg, Chinook Peak in winter File:Chinook Peak AB.jpg, Chinook Peak centered at top File:Flathead Range Crowsnest Pass area.jpg, Flathead Range
Left to rightː Mount Coulthard, Andy Good Peak, Mount Parrish, Chinook Peak. File:Chinook Peak - Alberta.jpg, Chinook Peak (left)

References

External links

* Chinook Pea
weather forecast
* Climbing Chinook Peak (photos)

{{Canadian Rockies, state=collapsed Two-thousanders of Alberta Flathead Range (Canada) Chinook Jargon place names Crowsnest Pass, Alberta