Mighty Burgess Shale fossil site discovered in Kootenay NP

Originally posted by Marko

[br]The PDF on the nature.com site shows the areas. http://www.nature.com/ncomms/201 ... f/ncomms4210-s1.pdf

The pictures on this site had embedded GPS coordinates in the exif info:
http://www.rom.on.ca/en/blog/mig ... tenay-national-park

I figured it would be prudent to notify them, and the coordinates have since been removed.

Originally posted by Marko

Damn it, I typed up a bunch of stuff and then hit refresh by accident and lost it all.. ahhh!

The PDF they show (http://www.nature.com/ncomms/201 ... /ncomms4210-s1.pdf) has five rectangles. Two are marked SG (Stanley Glacier), two MW (Mount Whymper) and the fifth MC (Marble Canyon). All their media refers to the discovery as the "Marble Canyon" site, indicating that the site is in the rectangle marked MC. They show the rectangles in blue and yellow. Blue is supposedly the deeper end between the Cathedral Escarpment and the Stephen formation. Burgess Shale lies in this area. I wonder if they've already looked through the other four sites. It would be interesting to scramble up the summit west of Mount Whymper, aiming through the blue rectangle in the PDF.

This diagram illustrates the Cathedral Escarpment:
http://burgess-shale.rom.on.ca/i ... ce_shale_geo_06.jpg

In the PDF they show the magenta line shows the Cathedral Escarpment. It can be seen on a grander scale here:

http://burgess-shale.rom.on.ca/i ... _shale_today_04.jpg

It passes through some beautiful places in the Rockies, including the Lake O'Hara area. I've always been interested in finding a scrambling route up Park Mountain and I'd like to get up Odaray this year. It looks like the Cathedral Escarpment line passes right through there. I'll have to keep an eye out for fossils. :)

This one shows the escarpment on a global scale 500 million years ago:
http://burgess-shale.rom.on.ca/i ... ce_shale_geo_05.jpg

Fascinating stuff!