2007_06_24 San Gabriel Mountains in haze

The San Gabriel Mountains are shattered heaps of rock, some up to 1.7 million years old (though most much younger), punched into the sky on the inside of a kink in the San Andreas Fault, which lies beyond them. A transverse — east-west — range of mountains rising up to ten thousand feet and more, they are coming down as fast as they are going up, requiring "debris basins" and dams as big as ones built for to hold back rivers, just to keep rocks and goopy flows of mud from crashing into the suburbs below. It is the San Gabriels, along with the San Bernardinos to the east, that surround the L.A. basin and contain the smog and haze in the air over the people who live there. Not all haze comes from smog, however. The crashing surf and other weather effects account for much (perhaps most) of it as well.

This was a lovely haze day, especially with the view toward the sun. Given the sunward view, and the fact that these were shot out an airplane window, they and came out remarkably well.

14 photos | 753 views

items are from between 24 Jun 2007 & 30 Jun 2007.