Xinjiang Ultra-Prominences - peaklist.org (original) (raw)

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Sinkiang - Xinjiang

53 Mountain Summits with Prominence of 1,500 meters or greater

According to our research, the People's Republic of China has 178 ultra-prominent summits. This is equal to almost 12% of the world's total, and ranks China as #1 in this category. 33 of these summits appear to be directly on the border with a neighboring country: Mongolia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, India, Nepal, Bhutan, North Korea, or Vietnam.

In order to best display the data, we are presenting the mountains of China on four lists:

Additionally, there is a high degree of overlap between the Tibet and Sinkiang lists and the High Asia I (Karakoram) and High Asia II (Central Himalaya) lists.

It is not our intention to make misleading statements about the proper borders in areas

disputed between China, India, Pakistan and Bhutan. We apologize for any errors of international borders, and are happy to be notified with corrections.

The four lists that comprise China reflective extensive research into names, elevations and prominence values conducted over a period of several years. China is completely mapped at 1:50,000 scale, but these maps are heavily restricted to the public and we

haveunfortunately not had access to much of this information. Information about source material is in the footnotes below.

Compiled 2003-6 by Jonathan de Ferranti, Eberhard Jurgalski and Aaron Maizlish. List ©2006 www.peaklist.org

minor corrections: March 26, 2011

Sources: Data Sources: This page represents years of compilation by the authors from a variety of sources including direct communication with researchers and from published material, principally 1) various mountaineering literature, 2) Soviet topographic mapping at 1:100,000 and 1:200,000, 3) extensive analysis of SRTM (Shuttle Radar Topography Mission) digital elevation data, 4) names and elevations in publications by the China Mountaineering Association and in the geonames database, 5) Chinese Snow Mountain topographic map series, and 6) both commercial and national topographic surveys including the recent Finnish survey of Nepal where applicable. We have striven to sort through extremely divergent elevation values and toponymy in order to provide a list that best reflects accurate and supportable data. Notably, we have analyzed all published values against SRTM for reasonableness, and in many cases propose here for the first time, elevation estimates that we believe are more accurate than old survey values.

Names: We have not been able to determine reliable placenames for a significant number of summits in China. The tradition in Tibet and China is to give a name to an entire mountain range, and many of the less-famous peaks do not have well-known local names apart from that of their range. Names in quotation marks are working names for unnamed summits (mostly in the Eastern Karakoram) from an unpublished 1984 study. Names in capitals are those that we transliterated directly from the cyrillic on the Russian topographic maps, and have not thus far confirm their accuracy or pinyin spelling. In addition, 28 peaks in China are name unknown, where we feel that the name of the larger range is not descriptive enough. Submissions of names are welcome.

Saddle and prominence values are derived almost exclusively from SRTM data, with some reliance on Soviet mapping. It is generally felt that these values are accurate to ±20 meters.

FOOTNOTES

[1] 7439m is the Soviet elevation. Chinese maps give an elevation of 7435m.

[4] Kongur Shan: Many sources give the elevation of Kongur at 7719m. The Guide to Mountaineering in China gives 7649m. Confusingly, the authoritive Chinese Snow Map gives both 7719m and 7649m on different sections of the map. After some analysis, we have decided to support the 7649m offered in the guide. Both sources give the elevation of the northeast dome as 7625m. In "Kongur: China's Elusive Summit" Chris Bonington writes that seen from the NE dome "(the main summit) is undoubtedly the highest point on Kongur, though probably by not more than thirty metres or so". Despite clear weather and lack of time, Bonington's party climbed both summits because, on reaching the main summit, they found that they could not be sure that the NE summit was lower. The two summits are ±700m apart; had there been a 94m height difference they would surely have seen clearly that the NE summit was lower. We have subsequently been informed by summiters that the 7649m is more consistent with GPS readings.

[5] Sauyr Zhotasy. According to Adam Helman, this peak appears to be unclimbed, and is one of the candidates for world's most prominent unclimbed summit.

[9] Muztagh Ata. The frequently cited 7546m elevation should be replaced by the newer 7509m elevation that appears on Chinese maps, and is more compatible with SRTM.

[11] Altitude of 5798 from CMG overruled by SRTM.

[19]

Chinese maps give an elevation of 6295m, but the Russian map figure of 6245m is more compatible with SRTM.

[48] "Kataklik Kangri" is our working name for the mountain on the India/Chinese Line of Control. We used the elevation of 6897m from the Soviet 1:100,000 map. There are two peaks slightly south that the Russians map shows as lower but which may be similar in height. The 1934 Visser map puts one of these peaks at 6952m, and the US aeronautical charts, which are generally less reliable, put the other peak variously at 6962m (ONC) or 6974m (TPC). The mountains are void on the SRTM, but in general SRTM and the Russian survey concur in this area.

[51] Russian map shows a high point of 6583m.

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