Lunch and Lecture with Dr. Eugene Kiver- “Solving Geologic Problems: Megafloods of Lava & Water in Eastern Washington”
Where: THE HIVE, Event A Room (Use Door Code 371047 # to enter.) Bring your lunch and enjoy this Floods lecture from Dr. Kiver during the lunch hour. The Chapter will provide a variety of beverages, cookies, and plates, utensils, cups, and crushed ice. There will be plenty of time for questions and answers! Description: The flat, non-mountainous topography of eastern Washington displaying mostly serene landscapes suggests a quiet geologic origin. However, a closer examination of the rocks, sediments and landforms tells a story of violence that would seem only Hollywood could invent! Massive floods of lava, some over 200’ thick and 300 miles long about 17 to 6 million years ago buried a hilly landscape turning the Columbia Plateau or Basin into a vast lava plain called a flood basalt field. No human has ever experienced lava flows of this magnitude. Later during the Pleistocene, huge continental glaciers covered most of North America and ground much of the underlying rock into silt-size particles that would later become the famous Palouse Soil. The glaciers also created a huge lake that repeatedly failed catastrophically and ripped the rock surface into an astonishing system of coulees, lakes, and other landforms that make up the Channeled Scabland. This lecture is free and open to the public. Dr. Kiver is Geology Professor Emeritus after teaching 34 years at Eastern Washington University. He studies glacial history in the West and volcanic history of the Cascade Mountains. He is a founding member of the Ice Age Floods Institute and a member of the IAFI Cheney-Spokane Chapter board of directors. If you will be coming, please RSVP to iaficheneyspokane@gmail.com with the number of people. This will help us get the right amount of supplies. Thank you!
