East Butte is a

summit A summit is a point on a surface that is higher in elevation than all points immediately adjacent to it. The topographic terms acme, apex, peak (mountain peak), and zenith are synonymous. The term (mountain top) is generally used only for ...

located in

Bingham County Bingham County is a county in the U.S. state of Idaho. As of the 2020 census, the population was 47,992. The county seat and largest city is Blackfoot. Bingham County comprises the Blackfoot, ID Micropolitan Statistical Area, which is includ ...

Idaho Idaho ( ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest and Mountain states, Mountain West subregions of the Western United States. It borders Montana and Wyoming to the east, Nevada and Utah to the south, and Washington (state), ...

, United States.

Description

East Butte and

line parent A peak's line parent is the closest higher peak on the highest ridge leading away from the peak's "key col". A col is the lowest point on the ridge between two summits and is roughly synonymous with pass, gap, saddle and notch. The highest col ...

Big Southern Butte were major landmarks for early explorers and pioneers. The remote mountain is situated over 40 miles east of

Craters of the Moon National Monument and Preserve Craters of the Moon National Monument and Preserve is a National monument (United States), U.S. national monument and national preserve in the Snake River Plain in central Idaho. It is along U.S. Route 20#Idaho, US 20 (Concurrency (road), concur ...

, 32 miles west of the community of

Idaho Falls Idaho Falls is the List of cities in Idaho, fourth most populous city in Idaho and the county seat of Bonneville County, Idaho, Bonneville County. It is the state's most populous city outside the Boise metropolitan area. As of the 2020 United St ...

, and can be seen from Highway 20 midway between Idaho Falls and

Arco Arco may refer to: Places * Arco, Trentino, a town in Trentino, Italy * Arco, Idaho, in the United States * Arco, Minnesota, a city in the United States * ARCO Arena in Sacramento, California, home of the Sacramento Kings Companies * ARCO (b ...

at milepost 274. East Butte is set on land belonging to the

Idaho National Laboratory Idaho National Laboratory (INL) is one of the national laboratories of the United States Department of Energy and is managed by the Battelle Energy Alliance. Historically, the lab has been involved with nuclear research, although the labora ...

so access is restricted even though a road leads to multiple radio towers at the top.

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 modest as the summit rises over above the Eastern

Snake River Plain The Snake River cutting through the plain leaves many canyons and Canyon#List of gorges, gorges, such as this one near Twin Falls, Idaho The Snake River Plain is a geology, geologic feature located primarily within the U.S. state of Idaho. ...

in one mile. This landform's toponym has been officially adopted by the

United States Board on Geographic Names The United States Board on Geographic Names (BGN) is a Federal government of the United States, federal body operating under the United States Secretary of the Interior. The purpose of the board is to establish and maintain uniform usage of geogr ...

Geology

East Butte is a

lava dome In volcanology, a lava dome is a circular, mound-shaped protrusion resulting from the slow extrusion of viscous lava from a volcano. Dome-building eruptions are common, particularly in convergent plate boundary settings. Around 6% of eruptions ...

composed of

aphanitic Aphanites (adj. ''aphanitic''; ) are igneous rocks that are so fine-grained that their component mineral crystals are not visible to the naked eye (in contrast to phanerites, in which the crystals are visible to the unaided eye). This geo ...

rhyolite Rhyolite ( ) is the most silica-rich of volcanic rocks. It is generally glassy or fine-grained (aphanitic) in texture (geology), texture, but may be porphyritic, containing larger mineral crystals (phenocrysts) in an otherwise fine-grained matri ...

. It formed around 600,000 years ago as sialic

magma Magma () is the molten or semi-molten natural material from which all igneous rocks are formed. Magma (sometimes colloquially but incorrectly referred to as ''lava'') is found beneath the surface of the Earth, and evidence of magmatism has also ...

flowed through a conduit in the basalt plain which surrounds the peak.''The Land Volcanoes Made: the Buttes of the Snake River Plain from Idaho Falls to Arco, Idaho'', railsback.org
/ref>

Climate

East Butte is located in a

cold semi-arid climate Cold is the presence of low temperature, especially in the atmosphere. In common usage, cold is often a subjective perception. A lower bound to temperature is absolute zero, defined as 0.00K on the Kelvin scale, an absolute thermodynamic ...

zone with warm summers and cold winters (

Köppen Köppen is a German surname. Notable people with the surname include: * Bernd Köppen (1951–2014), German pianist and composer * Carl Köppen (1833-1907), German military advisor in Meiji era Japan * Edlef Köppen (1893–1939), German author ...

''BSk''). Winter temperatures can drop below 0 °F with wind chill factors below −20 °F. Precipitation is relatively sparse.

Gallery

File:East Butte (5035997065).jpg, Northwest aspect File:East Butte (5035995703).jpg, Southwest aspect File:East Butte (5036624056).jpg, South aspect File:East Butte (5036616466).jpg, Southwest aspect File:East Butte (5036015509).jpg, North aspect File:East Butte, 1901.jpg, East Butte, 1901 File:East Butte (5035994699).jpg, Left to right: East Butte, Middle Butte, Big Southern Butte File:East Butte (of Twin Buttes).jpg, Aerial, looking south

References

{{reflist

External links

National Geodetic Survey Data Sheet
* East Butte
weather forecast
Mountains of Idaho Landforms of Bingham County, Idaho Two-thousanders of the United States Pleistocene lava domes Volcanoes of Idaho Lava domes of the United States