Road trip!
Road trip!
Next month I’ll be on a road trip for week with plans to travel through Florida’s panhandle. I’ll see museums I have not been to for nearly a decade and this time I will be taking a good camera, as opposed to what I was shooting with back in the day. I’m also looking forward to the quartz sand beaches with their whiteness and their “non stick” quality, unlike sand from limestone (calcium carbonate, Ca2CO3, the main stuff of antacid tablets). Quartz sand is the final remnant of mountain erosion, in this case the very old Appalachian Mountains of the eastern USA. Florida’s peninsula possesses the geology of a carbonate platform — oceanic and organic in its origin with karstic geomorphology — much like today’s Bahamas. The panhandle was made by continental geological processes — a resultant of chemical reactions with dendritic drainage. Florida’s structure was influenced by a hot spot, a long lasting plume from the Earth’s mantle. The path left by traveling over the hot spot began in Raton NM, later created the Ouchita Mountains in Arkansas, even later was the source of a volcano near Jackson MS (ultimately forming the Smackover oil trend), then an apparent course change (the hot spot is fixed in place while the geological plate moves over it) of the track to the southeast that created a rise in the Atlantic Ocean’s floor that enabled the Bahama Platform’s development by shallowing the depths and bringing the influence of sunlight so that photosynthetic algae (e.g., Halimeda sp.) began to precipitate calcium carbonate from the ocean (the mud ultimately lithifying into limestone). Voilà — carbonate platform island development!
Aside from geology, Florida has a rich and full aviation history and has 15 museums that I know of and here they are — selected from the Aviation Museums within the USA (grouped by state) list.
Note:
- * a post has been published, if interested please use the search window and the museum’s name
- ** a post is set to be published on this museum
Here is the Aviation Museums within the USA (grouped by state) list:
Air Force Armament Museum 100 Museum Dr, Eglin Air Force Base, FL 32542 (perhaps contrary to the title there are dozens of aircraft on display)
Camp Blanding Museum and Memorial Park* Camp Blanding Main Gate, from U.S. Hwy 301 in Starke FL go east on SR 16 (E Brownlee St) for 8 miles — both the museum and air park lie outside the main gate
DeLand Naval Air Station Museum* 910 Biscayne Blvd, DeLand, FL 32724
Fantasy of Flight* 1400 Broadway Blvd SE, Polk City, FL 33868
Florida Air Museum* 4175 Medulla Road, Lakeland, FL 33811
Historical Flight Foundation* (not built yet as a museum but have a restored DC-7B that is a flying exhibition, also have several aircraft pending for acceptance in the HFF)
Kissimmee Air Museum* Kissimmee Gateway Airport, 233 N Hoagland Blvd, Kissimmee, FL 34741
Miami Springs Historical Museum* (no web site) 26 Westward Dr, Miami Springs, FL 33166 — a small but rich museum. There are no aircraft, but the museum encompasses the unique history of the town including the life of Glenn Curtiss who had retired there. Indeed he was instrumental in developing the town with its Revival Pueblo Mission style. A rare seat from a Curtiss Condor is on exhibit. Call for the hours at 305-884-4406 or 305-888-4849.
NAS Fort Lauderdale Museum* on SW 34th Street on the west side of the Ft. Lauderdale–Hollywood International Airport, Ft. Lauderdale FL (a sign says open Monday through Thursday from 11am until 3pm — the upkeep is new though I have never seen it open during the stated operating hours). Oct 2010 — the museum contacted me an assures me that renovations are well under way, their web site is now operating and they plan to open to the public soon but appointments to visit can be made.
National Naval Aviation Museum (west gate of the Pensacola Naval Air Base near Pensacola FL)
National Navy UDT-SEAL Museum* 3300 N Hwy A1A, Ft. Pierce, FL 34949 (has a UH-1B and Apollo command module recovery training simulators)
St. Petersburg Museum of History** 335 2nd Ave NE, St Petersburg, FL 33701 (replica of the Benoist airboat that Tony Jannus flew in the world’s first airline operation)
Valiant Air Command Warbird Museum* 6600 Tico Rd, Titusville, FL 32780
Wings of Dreams Aviation Museum — Keystone Heights Airpark Keystone Heights Airport, 7100 Airport Road, Starke, FL 32091 (check web site for contact information to get phone numbers for calling about visitation hours)
Wings Over Miami Air Museum* 14710 SW 128th St, Miami, FL 33186
Ah!The joys of museum hopping! Have great time….and we all hope to see the results of your trip soon.
I have wondered about the erratic ‘course’ of a ‘hotspot’. Do you think that this is caused by the differential viscous drag at the boundary layer between the mantle and the crust, or even between the core and mantle? I say, reform the American Miscellaneous Society, and start drilling a new Project Mohole!
Shortfinals,
I’m always glad to talk about geology. You are current with the latest theories of hot spot mechanics. I don’t think anyone knows…the only way to “look” is with seismic techniques but I haven’t seen any journal articles. To me their core mystery is the fact that they do not move through eons of time. They may die out bit they do not move. They may be related to how a triple point forms (which then may extend into a rift, the creation of a continent, per se). The source of the immense energy and material must be the mantle, as you are aware, but whether viscous drag is a major factor I do not know and you may be right. The way to “see” what is happening is a conveniently located earthquake to provide seismic energy and scientists with sensors on hand to interpret the data — then we may be on our way to an answer.
I’ve been to Raton NM — it sits on one side of a pass, to the north is a mountain chain while the south falls away to a basin and the east is a volcanic plateau — even as a geology student I knew the place was odd. My teachers didn’t know about the hot spot origin, unfortunately they specialized in other areas but I learned of it through John McPhee’s excellent book “Annals of the Former World” which you ought to get if you don’t have it. McPhee writes in a conversational way, weaving geology with human history as well as interesting personages.
Mohole didn’t work out — too bad. We need data from projects like that! Like the ocean deep the deep geology of our planet is almost totally unknown and ripe for the sort of exploration that can ultimately change paradigms — what explorers and geologist live for
Yes! ‘Annals of the Former World’ – the geologist’s answer to Steinbeck’s ‘Travels with Charley’ ! Immensely significant work…..although his stuff on fishing is nearly as good!
One of these days SOMEONE is going to seriously think about drilling down to the Mohorovicic discontinuity. Just think of the thermal power to be tapped; it would make Iceland’s heat exchange system look like a 40 watt bulb. There are (ultimately) only two truly primary sources of energy on and in this planet – the nuclear reactions inside our little Sun (which will spend a total of 10 billion years on the Main Sequence) and the slowly diminishing heat energy from the massive, molton ferric core of Sol 3. Now, if only I could drag my thoughts away from the Yellowstone caldera. (If you want to see MASSIVE lava flows, then the Deccan Traps will scare you witless at c. 190,000 square miles, even after erosion and plate tectonics have nibbled away at it!)
The Deccan Traps … I’ve read much about them, especially in regard to the K-T boundary but have not seen them. You are fortunate. Other great volcanic extrusions come to mind: the mid Atlantic Ridge and the Siberian Traps. Geology is great for making one feel utterly small and insignificant!
Happy New Year! Hope that you and yours had a great time. By the way, you probably saw these articles,
Geology; March 2007; v. 35; no. 3; p. 223-226
Geology, Jun 2006; 34: 465 – 468
They both discuss models for analysis of hot-spot movement (particularly the one in Volume 34)…..interesting!
Take care
Happy New Year
Thanks for the cites — I’ll look them up at the local library. Finances had me give up the subscriptions years ago. But, learning of places to see is one of the blessings of studying geology