![mt whitney nasa picture of the day mt whitney nasa picture of the day](https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/image/1210/vdb1Blockc.jpg)
Since then the shape of the Earth (the geoid) has been estimated more accurately. An older plaque on the summit (sheet metal with black lettering on white enamel) reads "elevation 14,496.811 feet", but this was estimated using the older vertical datum ( NGVD29) from 1929. The peak was commonly said to be at 14,494 ft (4,418 m) and this is the elevation stamped on the USGS brass benchmark disk on the summit. The technology of elevation measurement has become more refined and, more importantly, the vertical coordinate system has changed. The estimated elevation of Mount Whitney's summit has changed over the years. Some water in the creek is allowed to continue on its natural course, joining the Owens River, which terminates at Owens Lake, an endorheic lake of the Great Basin. Historically, during very wet years, water overflowed from the Tulare Basin into the San Joaquin River, which flows to the Pacific Ocean.įrom the east, water from Mount Whitney flows to Lone Pine Creek, where most of the water is diverted into the Los Angeles Aqueduct via a sluice. Today, the water in the Tulare Basin is largely diverted for agriculture. The Kern River terminates at Bakersfield in the Tulare Basin, the southern part of the San Joaquin Valley. Waterways on the peak's west side flow into Whitney Creek, which flows into the Kern River. The mountain is the highest point on the Great Basin Divide.
![mt whitney nasa picture of the day mt whitney nasa picture of the day](https://ih1.redbubble.net/image.1571564953.8675/ur,mounted_print_canvas_portrait_small_detail,wide_portrait,750x1000.1.jpg)
The only animals are transient, such as the butterfly Parnassius phoebus and the gray-crowned rosy finch. Very few plants grow near the summit: one example is the sky pilot, a cushion plant that grows low to the ground. Mount Whitney is above the tree line and has an alpine climate and ecology. The mountain is partially dome-shaped, with its famously jagged ridges extending to the sides. It rises more gradually on the west side, lying only about 3,000 feet (914 m) above the John Muir Trail at Guitar Lake.
![mt whitney nasa picture of the day mt whitney nasa picture of the day](http://mjgradziel.com/ca2001/lng20.jpg)
The peak rises dramatically above the Owens Valley, sitting 10,778 feet (3,285 m) or just over 2 mi (3.2 km) above the town of Lone Pine 15 mi (24 km) to the east, in the Owens Valley. It lies near many of the Sierra Nevada's highest peaks. Mount Whitney's summit is on the Sierra Crest and the Great Basin Divide. Sky pilot blooming on ridge just below summit The eastern slopes are in Inyo National Forest in Inyo County. The mountain's west slope is in Sequoia National Park and the summit is the southern terminus of the John Muir Trail, which runs 211.9 mi (341.0 km) from Happy Isles in Yosemite Valley. It is in East– Central California, on the boundary between California's Inyo and Tulare counties, 84.6 miles (136.2 km) west-northwest of North America's lowest point, Badwater Basin in Death Valley National Park, at 282 ft (86 m) below sea level. Mount Whitney ( Paiute: Tumanguya Too-man-i-goo-yah) is the highest mountain in the contiguous United States and the Sierra Nevada, with an elevation of 14,505 feet (4,421 m).
![mt whitney nasa picture of the day mt whitney nasa picture of the day](https://i.pinimg.com/236x/08/c6/8d/08c68dc87282ac6f94c673c8e0b320e6--image-resolution-rosetta-spacecraft.jpg)
Inyo / Tulare counties, California, U.S.Īugby Charles Begole, Albert Johnson, and John Lucas.