Sailing stones, gliding stones, and moving stones all refer to a geological phenomenon where rocks move and inscribe long tracks along a smooth valley floor without human or animal intervention.
Stones with tough bottoms leave straight striated tracks while those with smooth bottoms often roam. Stones sometimes hand over, subjecting an additional advantage to the ground and leaving a various track in the stone's wake.
Trails vary in both instructions and length. Rocks that begin next to each various other might take a trip parallel temporarily, before one suddenly modifications direction to the left, right, or perhaps back to the instructions where it came. Path length additionally differs-- 2 likewise shapes and size stones may travel consistently, after that one could continue or quit in its track.
Tracks of sliding rocks have actually been noted and researched in numerous places, including Little Bonnie Claire Playa in Nevada, and most notably Racetrack Playa, Death Valley National Park, California, where the number and length of tracks are notable. As of August 2014, timelapse video clip footage of stones moving has been released, showing the rocks moving at reduced wind rates within the circulation of thin, melting sheets of ice.
The very first documented account of the moving stone sensation dates to 1915, when a prospector called Joseph Crook from Fallon, Nevada went to the Racetrack Playa website. In the following years, the Racetrack triggered interest from geologists Jim McAllister and Allen Agnew, that mapped the bedrock of the area in 1948 and published the earliest record regarding the gliding stones in a Geologic Society of America Bulletin. Their publication gave a quick description of the playa scrapers and furrows, explaining that no specific sizes had been taken and suggesting that furrows were the remnants of scrapes pushed by strong gusts of wind-- such as the changeable winds that produce dust-devils-- over a sloppy playa floor. Dispute over the origin of the furrows prompted the hunt for the occurrence of comparable phenomena at other places. Such a location was found at Little Bonnie Claire Playa in Nye County, Nevada, and the sensation was researched there.
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