Near Coulee City in Grant County, Washington — The American West (Northwest)
Explore Massive Floodscapes!
Photographed By Cosmos Mariner, July 31, 2015
1. Explore Massive Floodscapes! Marker
Inscription.
Explore Massive Floodscapes!. . Raging Ice Age floodwaters carved spectacular features throughout eastern Washington, creating unique landscapes. Follow the path of the floods and discover more about this amazing story. , Gouging Deep Coulees , The powerful floods cut steep-walled canyons, called coulees, including Frenchman Coulee, Moses Coulee, Potholes Coulee, and the largest of them all, Grand Coulee. , Are You a Landscape Detective? , Rocks, plants, and landscape features provide us with many clues about the Ice Age floods and other stories of the area’s past. What do the small lakes, called plunge pools, at the base of the cliffs tell you? , (left photo caption) , Grand Coulee is up to 800 feet deep and more than one mile wide in some places. Photo by Bill Correll , (center photo caption) , Ice Age floods carved Steamboat Rock, a streamlined basalt mesa in Grand Coulee about 30 miles north of here. Photo by Bob Carson , (right illustration caption) , A plunge pool is a deep depression scoured out by the force of water tumbling over a cliff. Today, these lakes and ponds are fed by groundwater.
Raging Ice Age floodwaters carved spectacular features throughout eastern Washington, creating unique landscapes. Follow the path of the floods and discover more about this amazing story.
Gouging Deep Coulees The powerful floods cut steep-walled canyons, called coulees, including Frenchman Coulee, Moses Coulee, Potholes Coulee, and the largest of them all, Grand Coulee.
Are You a Landscape Detective?
Rocks, plants, and landscape features provide us with many clues about the Ice Age floods and other stories of the area’s past. What do the small lakes, called plunge pools, at the base of the cliffs tell you?
(left photo caption) Grand Coulee is up to 800 feet deep and more than one mile wide in some places. Photo by Bill Correll
(center photo caption) Ice Age floods carved Steamboat Rock, a streamlined basalt mesa in Grand Coulee about 30 miles north of here. Photo by Bob Carson
(right illustration caption) A plunge pool is a deep depression scoured out by the force of water tumbling over a cliff. Today, these lakes and ponds are fed by groundwater.
Erected by Washington State Parks.
Topics. This historical marker is listed in this topic list: Natural Features.
Location.
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47° 36.429′ N, 119° 21.806′ W. Marker is near Coulee City, Washington, in Grant County. Marker can be reached from Park Lake Road Northeast (Washington Route 17) 2 miles south of U.S. 2, on the left when traveling south. Marker is located in Sun Lakes-Dry Falls State Park, on the east side of the Visitor Center parking lot, overlooking Dry Falls Lake. Touch for map. Marker is at or near this postal address: 34875 Park Lake Road Northeast, Coulee City WA 99115, United States of America. Touch for directions.
2. Marker detail: Travel the Paths of Ice Age Floods
lake — Lake Missoula — that flooded much of Montana. Eventually, the ice dam broke, unleashing floods up to 10 times the combined flow of all the rivers of the world into eastern Washington and Oregon. It was like a firehose that carved through the new channel opened by the Columbia. The turbulent water enlarged the channel and created huge waterfalls.
When the last flood subsided, large areas of eastern Washington were left scarred with dry channels, called coulees. This one, the Grand Coulee, is the largest. Cutting across the coulee is Dry Falls. This 3.5-mile wide and over 400-foot tall group of cliffs was at one time the largest waterfall in the world. (Submitted on February 8, 2019, by Cosmos Mariner of Cape Canaveral, Florida.)
Photographed By Cosmos Mariner, July 31, 2015
3. Massive Floodscapes! Marker (wide view; Dry Lake Falls in background; related marker on left)
Credits. This page was last revised on February 10, 2019. It was originally submitted on February 8, 2019, by Cosmos Mariner of Cape Canaveral, Florida. This page has been viewed 142 times since then and 11 times this year. Photos:1, 2, 3. submitted on February 8, 2019, by Cosmos Mariner of Cape Canaveral, Florida. • Bill Pfingsten was the editor who published this page.
