Armchair exploration (GEOG 1202)

The Canterbury Plains lie along the eastern side of the Southern Alps on New Zealand’s South Island.They also lay near the Alpine Fault, a transform boundary fault between the Indo-Australian and Pacific tectonic plates that slips laterally. The Indo-Australian plate also subducts under the Pacific plate near the south part of the island, causing vertical slip and uplift of the Southern Alps. Figure 1: The red lines show the transform fault boundary; however, the black line near bottom shows where the Indo-Australian plate subducts under the Pacific plate, causing the vertical slip and uplifting of the Southern Alps. High rates of erosion keep the Alps around 4000m tall (GNS). Invisible branches of the fault system (Marlborough Fault system) covered by layers of soil and debris carried down by erosion from the deformation of the Alps. The Canterbury Plains’ placement along the fault makes it more susceptible to earthquakes. Figure 2: This figure shows the historical pro...

The Canterbury Plain on the South Island of New Zealand is uniquely placed at the convergence of the Australian and Pacific tectonic plates. Together they form a right lateral strike-slip fault called the Alpine Fault, in which the two plates move horizontally alongside each other. However, when the fault has ruptured (the plates have suddenly slipped), the two plates have also moved vertically, creating the Southern Alps as one side of the fault slips upwards. Figure 1: This graphic shows the subduction of the Pacific plate to the Australian Plate in the North Island while the South Island has a transform boundary causing the Alpine Fault ("Plate Collision"). The subduction of the plates causes uplift of the Southern Alps along the Alpine fault (GNS) Figure 2: Here’s another graphic showing the subduction of the Pacific plate to the Indo-Australian plate, with the strike-slip transform boundary on the South Island as the two plates move laterally (Cayfo...

 New Zealand is well known for its beautiful diversity of landscape. The South Island especially has unique weather patterns from its diverse physical geography. An excellent example of this is the Southern Alps influence on the Canterbury Plains located on the southeast side of New Zealand’s South Island. Here one can witness one of the most dramatic weather patterns in the world - the Canterbury Nor’westerly, which usually takes place in the spring (Mullan, Tait, and Thompson). The Canterbury Nor’westerly is a wind pattern caused by prevailing westerly surface winds that carry low pressure winds eastward to the South Island; depressions (systems of low atmospheric pressure) develop in these winds as they travel east (Metservice). The  westerlies also contain a lot of  moisture; as they hit the Southern Alps on the South Island, they rise and cause a rainshadow effect that drops the majority of moisture on the western slope of the Alps but continue over the mountains to ...

My name is Gwen Kennicutt and I will be graduating this fall with a degree in International Studies from University of Colorado Denver. I am from Colorado, but spent the first few years of my life in Singapore before my family moved to the States. After graduating high school, I moved to New York state and danced with a Christian ballet company up there for two years, as well as lived in China for 6 months before I started at CU Denver. I love exploring other cultures and try to travel overseas once a year; so far I have been to 16 countries. When I am not dreaming about places to go, I am trying to build community on campus through the student organization Intervarsity Christian Fellowship, running, cooking, or practicing my latte art. For my location I have picked the Canterbury Plains of New Zealand. I have always wanted to go there as it is extremely beautiful and also a filming location of the Lord of the Rings movies. I am looking forward to looking at the physical geography of...