Cirrus Mountain is a mountain summit located in the upper

North Saskatchewan River The North Saskatchewan River is a glacier-fed river that flows from the Canadian Rockies continental divide east to central Saskatchewan, where it joins with the South Saskatchewan River to make up the Saskatchewan River. Its water flows eventual ...

valley on the shared boundary between

Banff National Park Banff National Park is Canada's oldest national park, established in 1885 as Rocky Mountains Park. Located in Alberta's Rocky Mountains, west of Calgary, Banff encompasses of mountainous terrain, with many glaciers and ice fields, dense conif ...

and

White Goat Wilderness Area The White Goat Wilderness Area is a provincially designated wilderness area in the Canadian Rockies of Alberta. It was established in 1961 and it, as one of the three wilderness areas of Alberta, has the strictest form of government protection av ...

, in the

Canadian Rockies The Canadian Rockies (french: Rocheuses canadiennes) 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 par ...

Alberta Alberta ( ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is part of Western Canada and is one of the three prairie provinces. Alberta is bordered by British Columbia to the west, Saskatchewan to the east, the Northwest Ter ...

, Canada. Cirrus Mountain is situated along the east side the

Icefields Parkway Highway 93 is a north–south highway in Alberta, Canada. It is also known as the Banff-Windermere Parkway south of the Trans-Canada Highway ( Highway 1) and the Icefields Parkway north of the Trans-Canada Highway. It travels through ...

midway between Saskatchewan Crossing and

Sunwapta Pass Sunwapta Pass (2,035 m/6,677 ft)Jasper National Park of Canada
...

Topographic relief Terrain or relief (also topographical relief) involves the vertical and horizontal dimensions of land surface. The term bathymetry is used to describe underwater relief, while hypsometry studies terrain relative to sea level. The Latin w ...

is significant as the summit rises 1,740 meters (5,708 ft) above the parkway in . The nearest higher peak is

Mount Stewart Mount Stewart is a 19th-century house and garden in County Down, Northern Ireland, owned by the National Trust. Situated on the east shore of Strangford Lough, a few miles outside the town of Newtownards and near Greyabbey, it was the Irish ...

, to the north-northeast.

History

In 1928, Morrison P. Bridgland suggested the name ''Mount Huntington'' for the mountain, but it was not adopted. However, the Huntington name endures as the name of the ''Huntington Glacier'' below the eastern aspect of the summit. The mountain was instead named Cirrus Mountain, and that toponym was officially adopted in 1935 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 Can ...

. The

first ascent In mountaineering, a first ascent (abbreviated to FA in guide books) is the first successful, documented attainment of the top of a mountain or the first to follow a particular climbing route. First mountain ascents are notable because they e ...

of the mountain was accomplished in 1939 by C.B. Sissons and H.J. Sissons.

Geology

Like other mountains in Banff Park, Cirrus Mountain is composed of

sedimentary rock Sedimentary rocks are types of rock that are formed by the accumulation or deposition of mineral or organic particles at Earth's surface, followed by cementation. Sedimentation is the collective name for processes that cause these particle ...

laid down from the

Precambrian The Precambrian (or Pre-Cambrian, sometimes abbreviated pꞒ, 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 th ...

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 Mya. The J ...

periods. Formed in shallow seas, this sedimentary rock was pushed east and over the top of younger 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, 70 to 80 million years ago, and ended 35 to 55 million years ago. The exact duration and ages of beginning and end of the o ...

. The east aspect of Cirrus Mountain is covered by expansive glacial ice known as the Huntington Glacier.

Climate

Based on the

Köppen climate classification The Köppen climate classification is one of the most widely used climate classification systems. It was first published by German-Russian climatologist Wladimir Köppen (1846–1940) in 1884, with several later modifications by Köppen, nota ...

, Cirrus Mountain is located in a subarctic climate with cold, snowy winters, and mild summers. Winter temperatures can drop below -20 °C with wind chill factors below -30 °C. Weather conditions during winter make the

Weeping Wall Weeping Wall may refer to: * Weeping Wall (Alberta), a geologic formation in Banff National Park, Alberta, Canada * Weeping Wall (Montana), a geologic formation in Glacier National Park, Montana, United States * "Weeping Wall" (instrumental), a 1 ...

at the base of Cirrus Mountain's west face the premier place for ice climbing in the Canadian Rockies. Precipitation

runoff Runoff, run-off or RUNOFF may refer to: * RUNOFF, the first computer text-formatting program * Runoff or run-off, another name for bleed, printing that lies beyond the edges to which a printed sheet is trimmed * Runoff or run-off, a stock market ...

from Cirrus Mountain drains into tributaries of the

Ice Climbing Routes

Ice Climbing Routes with grades on Cirrus Mountain * ''Polar Circus'' - WI5 * ''Snivelling Gully'' - WI3 * ''Weeping Wall'' - WI3-6 * ''Weeping Pillar'' - WI6

Gallery

File:Panoramic of Cirrus Mountain.jpg, Cirrus Mountain File:Mountain Ridge, Icefields Parkway (5829663240).jpg, The south peak of Cirrus (3,160+ m) File:Weeping Wall and Athabasca River Jasper.jpg, Weeping Wall File:Cirrus Mountain viewed from Parker Ridge.jpg, Cirrus Mountain viewed from Parker Ridge File:Cirrus Mountain, south peak.jpg, Cirrus Mountain (south peak) and the Weeping Wall

History

Geology

Climate

Ice Climbing Routes

Gallery

See also

References

External links