As an example of the disparity in points assigned to a summit in different associations, I submit for your consideration the aptly named Twin Benchmark in Colorado …and New Mexico.
In the 14er-rich Colorado this summit is a 2 pointer. The south summit of this “twin” lies in the state of New Mexico where this summit would be an 8 pointer!
Whatever the points handed out, I got to be the first one to activate this oddity yesterday. It was a delightful day and I was fortunate enough to activate two SOTA virgins, Twin Benchmark and Saritas Benchmark. Weirdly enough - both are exactly 8,284’!
It’s a shame you don’t need to use call area numbers when you are away from home any more in the USA. You could have activated it as " KG6MZS/5 on W0C/RG-164 " that would have had you a operating a 0 call area summit with 6 area call from the 5 call area. An event that would have got many a band policeman of old scratching their heads and saying you had to be doing something wrong.
Any more I don’t know what “away from home” means, though. KG6MZR and I are looking for a new home after being displaced by the California wildfires this last winter.
An unusual situation. I can see the AZs appear to sort of overlap but for the second peak you would need to cross the border and get another 4 contacts. The border would define the edge of the AZs surely. Happy to be corrected on that.
As you note if the region is blessed with big peaks the point distribution will differ from lesser endowed regions.
Hi Ron, I think since the W5N association doesn’t recognize the summit, it’s a moot point. Just a fun anomaly. It would be kinda cool if W5N did recognize this summit as well as W0C. Not sure if that would be by the book, though.
Imagine a New Year’s Rollover with 4 activations in just a few hours! It might become a thing.
There’s only 1 summit there for the purposes of SOTA - the next summit requires a drop of at least 150 m (492 ft) and the high point is on the W0C side, which is why W5N doesn’t recognise it. Activation zones know no boundaries.
If there is a resurvey and the W5N side is found to be higher, then the summit would probably move over to W5N and the points changed. This happened with G/WB-001 which became GW/SW-041.
Thanks for the clarification Pete. The south summit is not likely to be found higher in this geologic era. It would be a fun rule change to allow one summit to be shared by two associations in circumstances like this one.
Ah, I did think I could recall some summits where the highest point on a range in was in one country but the high part of the ridge in an adjoining country was claimed as another SOTA peak. The country border was said to be a cutoff.
I’m sorry that has been deemed to not be enough distinction.
There was at least one summit located at the tripoint of three associations and a team of activators would climb it, drop out of the activation zone and re-enter and get 30 points for a single ascent, and work each other from outside the activation zone, etc. The GRs are now updated to make it clear the ownership of the summit belongs to one association only and is assigned to the association with the largest activation zone area.
This can cause issues if one association is created before another association on its border and “claims” the summit first, in which case the AMs are required to fight to the death under the “There can be only one” principle. Upon conclusion of that death match, the MT will acknowledge the result by assigning the summit to the association with the largest activation zone area.
I should’ve known that this idea had already been a thing. I broke my longstanding rule not to question the wisdom of those that have done the work of setting the program up. From now on this particular peanut gallery shall remain mum.
I’m curious what other summits have this odd distinction.
I suspect there are quite a few where mountain ranges form international borders e.g. The Pyrenees and the Alps. EA3/LL-014 for one.
On the map it looks like there are a few between W7W and VE7 along the border.
There are plenty of summits that have an AZ crossing a border. Off the top of my head I can think of summits in Wales, England, Scotland, Lichtenstein, Andorra where the AZ cross a national boundary. There were some German/Czech and Polish/Czech summits that where the same but they have been deleted now.
It’s great fun being in the wrong country for the summit reference
That brings up an idea that interests me Pete. It would seem unlikely that summits along the northern border of the Western United States with Canada would align. By the time that border was established, science fixed the border along the 49º parallel. By contrast, in Europe such borders are far more organic and prone to rely on geographic features, like mountains.
This phenomena is glaringly apparent when one flies over the US midwest and parcels, townships, plats, roads and highways are all rectilinearly laid out along the cardinal compass points. Flying over Europe one sees radial lines emanating from population centers in directions favoring other population centers. An organic spiderweb of organization.
On the basis of AZ, the following VK1 border summits should be assigned to VK2: Mt Coree VK1/AC-023, Mt Clear VK1/AC-014 and Goorooyarroo VK1/AC-036. All three have a greater AZ mass in VK2. Coincidently each of the summit points value will increase significantly.
Seriously though, submit the evidence with other-Andrew and we can update accordingly. From memory the ref will change but the activations follow. All future activations use the new points, old activations are not updated
I’m not sure SOTA in Australia would survive if we followed the “there can be only one” principle applied to Andrews
I think this also affects the once-per-year scoring, so if you’ve activated it this year already, you won’t get the new points until next year. The principle is that it’s the same summit, just shifted association (which is how the DB treats it).
Also means that if you haven’t done them this year, hold off until the update goes in
Gents,
It looks like the border uses the summit peak survey point as a marker so the summit is exactly on the border and half each in the ACT and NSW. The relative areas of the AZ in each State is not the important decider.
Maybe the death fight still has validity. Or the first to claim it as a SOTA peak gets to keep it.
I won’t mention the possibility of it swapping from one Association to the other on an annual basis.,
