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Anthracite Range
Anthracite Range, West Elk Mountains, Gunnison County, Colorado, USA 02.jpg
Anthracite Range
Highest point
Peak Anthracite Range High Point
Elevation 12,394 ft (3,778 m)
Prominence 2,105 ft (642 m)
Geography
Anthracite Range is located in Colorado
Anthracite Range
Anthracite Range
Location in Colorado
Country United States
State Colorado
County Gunnison
Parent range West Elk Mountains, Rocky Mountains

The Anthracite Range is a mountain range in the West Elk Mountains, a sub-range of the Rocky Mountains of North America. The range is located in Gunnison County of western Colorado and lies within the West Elk Wilderness of the Gunnison National Forest. The Anthracite Range is one of several prominent laccoliths found in the West Elk Mountains.


Geology

The Anthracite Range is a laccolith, formed when magma intruded into sedimentary strata of the Mesaverde Formation approximately 30 million years ago. Subsequent erosion has removed the softer, overlying sedimentary rock thereby exposing the more resistant igneous rock that characterizes the mountain today. The range is composed of quartz monzonite porphyry and granodiorite porphyry. The Anthracite Range was glaciated, and the most prominent glacial cirques are located on the north and east sides of the range.

The range is named after anthracite, a high-quality, metamorphized coal found in the sedimentary rock of the Mesaverde Formation at the base of this and nearby laccoliths.

Summits

The Anthracite Range is an east-west oriented ridge less than 5 miles (8 km) in length, but there are several summits of interest to mountaineers and peakbaggers. From west to east, these summits include: the Anthracite Range High Point (elevation 12,385 ft (3,775 m), prominence 2,125 ft (648 m)); Unnamed Peak 12,300 (elevation 12,300 ft (3,700 m); Ohio Peak (elevation 12,271 ft (3,740 m)); and Unnamed Peak 11,555 (elevation 11,555 ft (3,522 m). These summits are most often accessed from Ohio Pass where a climbers trail enters the wilderness area, traverses southwest across talus slopes then up through a cirque to the ridge just west of Unnamed Peak 11,555. From there, the summits are reached by hiking along the ridge.

Gallery

  • Anthracite Range, West Elk Mountains, Gunnison County, Colorado, USA 01

    Anthracite Range from the southeast

  • Ohio Peak, Anthracite Range, West Elk Mountains, Gunnison County, Colorado, USA 01

    Ohio Peak, the only officially named summit in the Anthracite Range

  • Anthracite Range geologic cross section USGS 1987

    Geologic cross section of the Anthracite Range

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