Speaker:Rick Thompson, President of the Lower Columbia Chapter – Ice Age Floods Institute

The Glacial Missoula Floods And Their Effect On Our Backyard.

A native Oregonian, Mr. Thompson loves to share the beauty and natural history of the great Northwest.

Being intrigued by the land formations, huge boulders and glacial erratics in this area he embarked on a 20-year study of the effects in NW Oregon and SW Washington of the largest ice age flood which propelled over 500 cubic miles of water, ice, rock and mud across eastern Washington, raced through the Columbia River Gorge, covered the Willamette Valley with up to 400 feet of water and left gravel bars miles wide and hundreds of feet high.  Though geology is not his profession, the Lake Missoula Floods have become his passion.

Mr. Thompson is President of the Lower Columbia Chapter of the Ice Age Floods Institute which holds monthly public educational meetings in Tualatin.  He was instrumental in identifying and securing signage for several significant glacial erratics in Washington County; has been interviewed for a number of newspaper articles and was twice featured on Grant McOmie’s “Grant’s Getaways” television program.

He has created self-guided driving tours based on his field trips and has authored two books: “Iceberg Erratics” and “GigaFlood – The Lake Missoula Flood in NW Oregon and SW Washington” which is illustrated with his own photographs, maps and diagrams to show you the signs still visible today from this catastrophic flood which so affected the Northwest.