Pensacola Mountains
Highest point
Peak	England Peak[1]
Elevation	2,150 m (7,050 ft)
Coordinates	82°37′S 52°49′W / 82.617°S 52.817°W / -82.617; -52.817
Dimensions
Length	450 km (280 mi)
Area	86,850 km2 (33,530 sq mi)
Geography
Location in Antarctica
Continent	Antarctica
Region	Queen Elizabeth Land
Range coordinates	84°2′S 61°22′W / 84.033°S 61.367°W / -84.033; -61.367
Parent range	Transantarctic Mountains

The Pensacola Mountains are a large group of mountain ranges of the Transantarctic Mountains System, located in the Queen Elizabeth Land region of Antarctica.

Geography

They extend 450 km (280 mi) in a NE-SW direction. Subranges of the Pensacola Mountains include: Argentina Range, Forrestal Range, Dufek Massif, Cordiner Peaks, Neptune Range, Patuxent Range, Rambo Nunataks and Pecora Escarpment. These mountain units lie astride the extensive Foundation Ice Stream and Support Force Glacier which drain northward to the Ronne Ice Shelf.^[2]

Naming

Discovered and photographed on 13 January 1956 in the course of a transcontinental nonstop plane flight by personnel of United States Navy Operation Deep Freeze I from McMurdo Sound to Weddell Sea and return. Named by US-ACAN for the U.S. Naval Air Station, Pensacola, Florida, in commemoration of the historic role of that establishment in training aviators of the U.S. Navy. The mountains were mapped in detail by USGS from surveys and US Navy air photos, 1956–67.^[2]

Geology

The Pensacola Mountains were originally continuous with the Ventana Mountains near Bahía Blanca in Argentina, Cape Fold Belt in South Africa, the Ellsworth Mountains (West Antarctica) and the Hunter-Bowen orogeny in eastern Australia.

The Ordovician-Devonian Neptune Group rests unconformably on a Cambrian succession, and is overlain disconformably by the Dover Sandstone of the Beacon Supergroup. Within the Neptune Group is the Brown Ridge Conglomerate, Elliott Sandstone, Elbow Formation, and the Heiser Sandstone.^[3]

Features

Geographical features include:

Further reading

• Gunter Faure, Teresa M. Mensing, The Transantarctic Mountains: Rocks, Ice, Meteorites and Water, P 233
• M.J.Bentley, A.S.Hein, D.E.Sugden, P.L.Whitehouse, R.Shanks, S.Xu, S.P.H.T.Freeman, Deglacial history of the Pensacola Mountains, Antarctica from glacial geomorphology and cosmogenic nuclide surface exposure dating, Quaternary Science Reviews Volume 158, 15 February 2017, Pages 58–76, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.quascirev.2016.09.028
• JOHN C. BEHRENDT, JOHN R. HENDERSON, LAURENT ElSTER, and WILLIAM L. RAMBO, Geophysical Investigations of the Pensacola Mountains and Adjacent Glacierized Areas of Antarctica, GEOLOGICAL SURVEY PROFESSIONAL PAPER 844
• Curtis, M. (2002), Palaeozoic to Mesozoic polyphase deformation of the Patuxent Range, Pensacola Mountains, Antarctica, Antarctic Science, 14(2), 175–183. https://doi:10%5B%5D.1017/S0954102002000743
• Myrl E. Beck, Palaeomagnetism and Magnetic Polarity Zones in the Jurassic Dufek Intrusion, Pensacola Mountains, Antarctica, Geophysical Journal International, Volume 28, Issue 1, May 1972, Pages 49–63, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-246X.1972.tb06110.x
• Hodgson, Dominic A Bentley, Michael J, Lake highstands in the Pensacola Mountains and Shackleton Range 4300–2250 cal. yr BP: Evidence of a warm climate anomaly in the interior of Antarctica, https://doi.org/10.1177/0959683612460790
• Karolien Peeters (UGent), Dominic A Hodgson, Peter Convey and Anne Willems (UGent), Culturable diversity of heterotrophic bacteria in Forlidas Pond (Pensacola Mountains) and Lundström Lake (Shackleton Range), Antarctica, (2011) MICROBIAL ECOLOGY. 62(2). p. 399-413

References