JACKSON, Wyo. — To celebrate 60 years of skiing in the Tetons, Jackson Hole Mountain Resort (JHMR) has released a video honoring the geologic history and “tectonic wonder” that helped forge the peaks, faces and chutes of the iconic ski area.
“Layers of Time” is a 13-minute short that describes the various features and rocky history of the mountain under the snow. U.S. Forest Service Geologist Dominique Brough describes the various layers, and walks viewers through how the beloved ski hill is shaped by its past. According to Brough, the Teton fault was born about 10 million years ago, and the Teton Range is one of the youngest in North America.
“As we celebrate our 60th, we would be remiss not to celebrate the fault line that produced our favorite fall lines,” JHMR wrote in a press release.
Brough brings viewers back in time and chronicles the geologic layers of Rendezvous Mountain, starting with the sedimentary ocean layers in the top one-third of the hill. The Darby Formation was formed in a shallow marine sea about 370 million years ago, and it consists of strong bedrock that offers a good platform to anchor in the tram dock.
In the video, JHMR’s Head of Tram Maintenance Mike Vase discusses the building of the original tram and the tram’s recent reconstruction in 2008. According to Vase, the construction company that built the current tram took into account potential future seismic activity, and drilled the deep-foundation micropiles 40 feet into the rock, making it one of the strongest structures in the Tetons.
Brough then moves down the mountain and points out the Bighorn Dolomite, a 460 million-year-old layer of “visually stunning” cliff faces. Some of the most famous chutes and couloirs are found in this layer, including S&S Couloir, Corbet’s Couloir and the permanently closed Cajun Couloir.
“As you ski down, you go through geologic time,” says Brough.
Moving down a layer, the 500 million-year-old Cambrian Formations are home to petrified stromatolites found near Tower Four, which are layered rocks formed from blue-green algae in the ocean. They now sit at approximately 9,000 feet above the current sea level, just above Expert Chutes. Those chutes are located in a layer of Death Canyon Limestone, right above the area known as “Broken Goggle,” which is the Wolsey Shale — an easily erodible slope that makes the perfect runout for the Expert Chutes.
Below all of that, a majority of the ski runs and chairlifts are situated on the layers formed during the Archean Era, about 3 billion years ago. Watch the full video here to take a trip through time and learn more about how the first chairlifts were built into this Rocky Mountain gem.
