Uinta Mountains

Uinta Mountains
This view of Kings Peak and the Henry's Fork Basin shows the cliff bands and basins typical throughout the Uintas.
Highest point
Peak	Kings Peak
Elevation	13,528 ft (4,123 m)
Coordinates	40°46′34″N 110°22′22″W / 40.776111°N 110.372778°W / 40.776111; -110.372778Coordinates: 40°46′34″N 110°22′22″W / 40.776111°N 110.372778°W / 40.776111; -110.372778
Geography
Country	United States
States	Utah and Wyoming
Parent range	Rocky Mountains
Geology
Age of rock	Precambrian
Type of rock	quartzite, shale, and slate

The Uinta Mountains /juːˈɪntə/ are an east-west trending chain of mountains in northeastern Utah extending slightly into southern Wyoming in the United States. As a subrange of the Rocky Mountains, they are unusual for being the highest range in the contiguous United States running east to west, and lie approximately 100 miles (160 km) east of Salt Lake City. The range has peaks ranging from 11,000–13,528 feet (3,353–4,123 m), with the highest point being Kings Peak, also the highest point in Utah. The Mirror Lake Highway crosses the western half of the Uintas on its way to Wyoming.

The Uinta Mountains are Laramide uplifted metasedimentary rocks deposited in an intracratonic basin in southwest Laurentia during the time of the breakup of the supercontinent Rodinia. The marine and fluvial metasedimentary rocks in the core of the Uinta Mountains are of Neoproterozoic age (between about 700 million and 800 million years old) and consist primarily of quartzite, slate, and shale. These rocks comprise the Uinta Mountain Group, and reach thicknesses of 4 to 7.3 kilometres (13,000 to 24,000 ft). Most of the high peaks are outcrops of the Uinta Mountain Group. Many of the peaks are ringed with bands of cliffs, rising to form broad or flat tops. The mountains are bounded to the north and south by reverse faults that meet below the range, on the north by the North Flank fault and on the south by the Uinta Basin boundary fault.