A volcano is a rupture in the crust of a planetary-mass object, such as Earth, that allows hot lava, volcanic ash, and gases to escape from a magma chamber below the surface.
James Edmound Shea Jr. is an American retired skeleton racer who won the gold medal at the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City. Shea also was chosen by fellow athletes to recite the Athlete's Oath during the Opening Ceremonies. Along with his father, Jim Shea Sr., he passed the Olympic Torch to Cammi Granato and Picabo Street who then passed it to the 1980 U.S. Men's Hockey Team, who then ignited the Olympic Cauldron. Shortly before the Olympics he was a guest of Laura Bush in the First Lady's Box at the 2002 State of the Union Address.
The Cascade Range or Cascades is a major mountain range of western North America, extending from southern British Columbia through Washington and Oregon to Northern California. It includes both non-volcanic mountains, such as the North Cascades, and the notable volcanoes known as the High Cascades. The small part of the range in British Columbia is referred to as the Canadian Cascades or, locally, as the Cascade Mountains. The latter term is also sometimes used by Washington residents to refer to the Washington section of the Cascades in addition to North Cascades, the more usual U.S. term, as in North Cascades National Park. The highest peak in the range is Mount Rainier in Washington at 14,411 feet (4,392 m).
The Hawaiian Islands are an archipelago of eight major islands, several atolls, numerous smaller islets, and seamounts in the North Pacific Ocean, extending some 1,500 miles from the island of Hawaiʻi in the south to northernmost Kure Atoll. Formerly the group was known to Europeans and Americans as the Sandwich Islands, a name chosen by James Cook in honor of the then First Lord of the Admiralty John Montagu, 4th Earl of Sandwich. The contemporary name is derived from the name of the largest island, Hawaii Island.
The Ring of Fire is a major area in the basin of the Pacific Ocean where many earthquakes and volcanic eruptions occur. In a large 40,000 km (25,000 mi) horseshoe shape, it is associated with a nearly continuous series of oceanic trenches, volcanic arcs, and volcanic belts and plate movements. It has 452 volcanoes. The Ring of Fire is sometimes called the circum-Pacific belt.
The Basin and Range Province is a vast physiographic region covering much of the inland Western United States and northwestern Mexico. It is defined by unique basin and range topography, characterized by abrupt changes in elevation, alternating between narrow faulted mountain chains and flat arid valleys or basins. The physiography of the province is the result of tectonic extension that began around 17 million years ago in the early Miocene epoch.
A crater lake is a lake that forms in a volcanic crater or caldera, such as a maar; less commonly and with lower association to the term a lake may form in an impact crater caused by a meteorite, or in the crater left by an artificial explosion caused by humans. Sometimes lakes which form inside calderas are called caldera lakes, but often this distinction is not made. Crater lakes covering active (fumarolic) volcanic vents are sometimes known as volcanic lakes, and the water within them is often acidic, saturated with volcanic gases, and cloudy with a strong greenish color. For example, the crater lake of Kawah Ijen in Indonesia has a pH of under 0.5. Lakes located in dormant or extinct volcanoes tend to have fresh water, and the water clarity in such lakes can be exceptional due to the lack of inflowing streams and sediment.
The Samoan Islands are an archipelago covering 3,030 km2 (1,170 sq mi) in the central South Pacific, forming part of Polynesia and the wider region of Oceania. Administratively, the archipelago comprises all of Samoa and most of American Samoa. The two Samoan jurisdictions are separated by 64 km (40 mi) of ocean.
Picabo Street is an American former World Cup alpine ski racer and Olympic gold medalist. She won the super G at the 1998 Winter Olympics and the downhill at the 1996 World Championships, along with three other Olympic and World Championship medals. Street also won World Cup downhill season titles in 1995 and 1996, the first American woman to do so, along with nine World Cup downhill race wins. Street was inducted into the National Ski Hall of Fame in 2004.
The Yellowstone hotspot is a volcanic hotspot in the United States responsible for large scale volcanism in Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Oregon, and Wyoming as the North American tectonic plate moved over it. It formed the eastern Snake River Plain through a succession of caldera-forming eruptions. The resulting calderas include the Island Park Caldera, the Henry's Fork Caldera, and the Bruneau-Jarbidge caldera. The hotspot currently lies under the Yellowstone Caldera. The hotspot's most recent caldera-forming supereruption, known as the Lava Creek eruption, took place 640,000 years ago and created the Lava Creek Tuff, and the most recent Yellowstone Caldera. The Yellowstone hotspot is one of a few volcanic hotspots underlying the North American tectonic plate; others include the Anahim and Raton hotspots.
Bald Mountain is a mountain in south central Idaho, adjacent to the city of Ketchum in Blaine County. Baldy has one of the higher summits of the Smoky Mountains of Idaho, that are located in the Sawtooth National Forest. The forested Smoky Mountains were named for their propensity to summer forest fires.
Agathla Peak is a peak south of Monument Valley, Arizona, which rises over 1500 feet above the surrounding terrain. It is 7 miles (11 km) north of Kayenta and is visible from U.S. Route 163. The English designation Agathla is derived from the Navajo name aghaałą́ meaning 'much wool', apparently for the fur of antelope and deer accumulating on the rock. The mountain is considered sacred by the Navajo.
Central Idaho is a geographical term for the region located northeast of Boise and southeast of Lewiston in the U.S. state of Idaho. It is dominated by federal lands administered by the United States Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management. Idaho's tallest mountain, Borah Peak, is located in this region. A large part of the Sawtooth National Recreation Area is within Central Idaho.
Kvitfjell is a ski resort in Norway, located in the municipality of Ringebu.
The USOC Athlete of the Year awards are presented on an annual basis by the United States Olympic Committee to athletes who have distinguished themselves in one of the Olympic or Paralympic sports. Awards are presented to the Olympic or Paralympic SportsMan of the Year, SportsWoman of the Year, and Team of the Year.
Miss America 1999, the 72nd Miss America pageant, was held at the Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City, New Jersey on Saturday, September 19, 1998 on ABC Network.
The Aleutian Islands, also called the Aleut Islands or Aleutic Islands and known before 1867 as the Catherine Archipelago, are a chain of 14 large volcanic islands and 55 smaller ones belonging to both the U.S. state of Alaska and the Russian federal subject of Kamchatka Krai. They form part of the Aleutian Arc in the Northern Pacific Ocean, occupying an area of 6,821 sq mi (17,666 km2) and extending about 1,200 mi (1,900 km) westward from the Alaska Peninsula toward the Kamchatka Peninsula in Russia, and mark a dividing line between the Bering Sea to the north and the Pacific Ocean to the south. Crossing longitude 180°, at which point east and west longitude end, the archipelago contains both the westernmost part of the United States by longitude and the easternmost by longitude. The westernmost U.S. island in real terms, however, is Attu Island, west of which runs the International Date Line. While nearly all the archipelago is part of Alaska and is usually considered as being in the "Alaskan Bush", at the extreme western end, the small, geologically related Commander Islands belong to Russia.
Stars Earn Stripes was a reality television program that premiered on NBC on August 13, 2012. Produced by Mark Burnett, the series follows a group of celebrities, accompanied by current and former members of the United States Armed Forces and law enforcement, competing in various challenges for charity based on training exercises used by the U.S. military. The series is hosted by retired NATO Supreme Allied Commander and former Presidential candidate Wesley Clark and former Dancing with the Stars co-host Samantha Harris. The title is a reference to how the stars would earn stripes on their uniforms when they advanced to the next round of the competition.
