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A broad snow-capped volcano streaked with red rock rises into a deep blue sky above a bare high plain where a single vicuña stands in the foreground.
WonderScience fact

Mount Everest is highest above sea level, but Ecuador's Chimborazo has the summit farthest from Earth's centre because the planet bulges at the equator.

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The story behind the card

Earth is slightly flattened: its spin makes it bulge at the equator, so the equatorial radius is about 21 kilometres greater than the polar one. Chimborazo, a volcano in the Andes, stands 6,263 metres above sea level only about one degree south of the equator, right on that bulge. Everest is much higher above sea level, 8,849 metres by the 2020 survey, but it lies nearly 28 degrees north, where the surface is closer to the centre. As a result, Chimborazo's summit is about 6,384 kilometres from Earth's centre, roughly 2 kilometres farther out than Everest's. Measured from base to peak, the tallest mountain is different again: Mauna Kea in Hawaii, most of which lies under the sea.

Türkçe oku
Deniz seviyesine göre en yüksek dağ Everest'tir; ama Dünya ekvatorda şişkin olduğu için gezegenin merkezine en uzak zirve Ekvador'daki Chimborazo'dur.

Dünya tam bir küre değildir: kendi ekseni çevresinde dönmesi yüzünden ekvatorda şişer, bu yüzden ekvatordaki yarıçapı kutuplardakinden yaklaşık 21 kilometre fazladır. And Dağları'ndaki bir yanardağ olan Chimborazo, deniz seviyesinden 6.263 metre yüksekliktedir ve ekvatorun yalnızca bir derece kadar güneyinde, tam bu şişkinliğin üstünde durur. Everest deniz seviyesine göre çok daha yüksektir, 2020 ölçümüne göre 8.849 metre; ama yaklaşık 28 derece kuzeyde, yüzeyin merkeze daha yakın olduğu bir yerdedir. Sonuçta Chimborazo'nun zirvesi Dünya'nın merkezinden yaklaşık 6.384 kilometre uzaktadır; Everest'in zirvesinden 2 kilometre kadar daha dışarıda. Eteğinden zirvesine ölçülünce en uzun dağ ise bambaşkadır: büyük bölümü denizin altında kalan, Hawaii'deki Mauna Kea.

Sources and further reading

Image details

Chimborazo, Ecuador, September 2011; a wild vicuña stands in the foreground.

Photo: David Torres Costales / Riobamba, 2011, via Wikimedia Commons. Licence: CC BY-SA 3.0.

Image source · CC BY-SA 3.0

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Background reading: Chimborazo
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