If the Himalayas are a wall of rock, there is no mountain range on earth more majestic and majestic. Guarding China's southwestern frontier, it towers over the clouds and stretches east and west, and is the top of the earth, an insurmountable natural obstacle between the hinterland of the Tibetan Plateau and the South Asian subcontinent. At the same time, as the "third pole" of the earth, the accumulation of thick glaciers has brought water of life to the surrounding 1.8 billion people, becoming the "South Asian water tower", and then becoming the source of Indo-Tibetan culture, changing the course of Asian civilization.
The world's highest mountain range on the edge of the Tibetan Plateau
The Himalayas meander along the southern edge of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, stretching from Nanga Parbat Peak in Kashmir in the west to Nanga Bawa Peak at the bend of the Brahmaputra River in the east, in an arc protruding from south to west, spanning 2,450 kilometers from east to west and 200-300 kilometers wide. The Himalayas are the highest mountain range in the world, with as many as 110 peaks over 7,000 meters, and 10 of the world's 14 peaks above 8,000 meters above sea level, including Mount Everest, the world's highest peak at 8,848.86 meters above sea level (2020).
The mountains around Mount Everest taken from the International Space Station, the lake is Peku wrong, the picture is from @NASA
But the Himalayas are not towering, and 65 million years ago the Himalayas were located on the bottom of an ocean called the New Tethys Ocean. Since the Indian plate "broke up" with the African plate 80 million years ago, it drifted northward for more than 6,400 kilometers at a rate of 25-30 centimeters per year for 30 million years, and finally crashed into the Eurasian plate 50.5 million years ago, and the 1,000-kilometer-wide rock was squeezed to only 250 kilometers wide. The ancient New Tethys Ocean was separated from the sea and landed, and the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau basically ended the marine era, which is what academics call the "Himalayan orogeny".
Himalayan orogeny also makes the composition system of the entire Himalayas distinct, in the Himalayan from south to north of the 200-300 km span, can be divided into the outer Himalayas, the Little Himalayas, the Great Himalayas and the Tethys Himalayas these four horizontal mountain belts, each mountain belt has obvious topographic characteristics and geological characteristics, and in the length of 2450 kilometers, it can also be divided into three sections according to the river: the west of the Pulan Peacock River is the western section, and the middle section between the Pulan Peacock River and the Yadong River, East of the Yadong River is the eastern section.
In this violent tectonic movement that lasted for thousands of years, the Indian plate continued to subduct under Eurasia, and the powerful squeeze force caused by the collision, the Neo-Tethyan Ocean fold bulged, and the Himalayas began to form. Finally, by 15 million years ago, the Himalayas were close to their current height, and then the Indian plate continued to subduct and squeeze towards the southern edge of Eurasia at a rate of about 5 centimeters per year along the Brahmaputra suture belt, so that the Himalayas are still rising to this day.
However, the annual speed of 5 centimeters for the global geological plate is a high-speed movement, which will inevitably accumulate huge energy, and the earth's means of releasing energy in addition to volcanic eruptions, is an earthquake, so the Himalayas are also a high incidence of earthquakes. For example, the 8.1 magnitude earthquake in Pokhara, Nepal in 2015 caused many casualties and huge property damage in Nepal.
The towering force of nature in the Himalayas
The Himalayas, which have risen in the long geological era, are like a tall city wall, stretching across the borders of South Asia, Central Asia and East Asia, and have also achieved a very different geographical environment between the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau in the north and the South Asian subcontinent in the south. Due to their high altitude, as well as the influence of the southwest monsoon and westerly wind belts, the Himalayas became the center of glacier development.
In summer, warm and humid water vapor from the Indian Ocean rushes all the way to the Himalayas with the South Asian monsoon, is blocked by towering mountains and climbs, and after being cold, the water vapor in the clouds condenses into snow and falls from the sky. So the name of the Himalayas means "the homeland of snow" in Tibetan. Glaciers are formed by a series of physical evolutions such as compaction and meltwater transformation.
There are 17,297 modern glaciers in the Himalayas, with a total area of about 34,782 square kilometers, and the main valley glaciers are more than 10 kilometers long. For example, the Remu Glacier on the eastern slope of Kanchenjunga Peak in the middle of the Himalayas is the longest glacier in the Himalayas with a length of 28 kilometers; There is also the Gabra Glacier on the northern slope of the Cho Oyo Peak, which is 21 km long, and the Gezhongba Glacier on the southern slope, which is 22 km long.
The reason why there are so many glaciers in the Himalayas is not only related to the South Asian monsoon and altitude, but also closely related to the topography of the northern and southern slopes of the Himalayas. The southern slopes of the Himalayas are high and deep, densely forested, and the vertical zonality of the natural landscape is obvious.
The northern slope is an alpine wide valley basin, its natural belt is very different from the southern slope, 4000 to 5000 meters above sea level for the plateau cold semi-arid steppe belt, occasionally voldepress and other shrubs, 5000 to 5600 meters for alpine frozen meadow vegetation belt, 5600 to 6000 meters for alpine frozen lichen belt, more than 6000 meters for alpine ice and snow belt, so most glaciers on the north slope, the ice surface is clean, the moraine is thin, and all are above the permafrost.
The southern slope is specifically manifested as a mountain subtropical evergreen broad-leaved forest belt between 1600 and 2500 meters above sea level, a mixed coniferous and broad-leaved forest in the mountain warm temperate zone between 2500 and 3100 meters, a mountain cold temperate coniferous forest between 3100 and 4000 meters, a subalpine shrubland meadow belt between 4000 and 4700 meters, an alpine frozen meadow mat-like vegetation belt between 4700 and 5200 meters, an alpine frozen lichen belt between 5200 and 5500 meters, and an alpine ice and snow belt above 5500 meters. Therefore, most of the large glaciers on the southern slope are covered with moraine moraines, moraine hills and glacial lakes in the lower and middle sections.
In terms of precipitation vapor replenishment, the western part of the Himalayas in Kashmir, by the Mediterranean westerly belt precipitation replenishment, winter and spring snowfall, most glaciers are winter and spring replenishment type marine glaciers, and the eastern end of the Himalayas, especially the area adjacent to the Brahmaputra Grand Canyon, is the Bay of Bengal South Asian summer wind north channel, so the development of monsoon marine glaciers. These glaciers, which store a lot of fresh water, have become the source of many rivers.
The water tower of South Asia, the source of the rivers
The 19 water systems collected by these glaciers provide valuable water for the Indus, Ganges, Brahmaputra and Brahmaputra rivers, providing water for the production and domestic life of 1.8 billion people in the middle and lower reaches. For example, the Indus River, whose source is the Shiquan River (Senge Zangpo in Tibetan), originates from the Kailas Peak glacier north of Mount Kailash and flows from southeast to northwest through Kashmir, collecting water from the western part of the Himalayas, turning southwest through the entire territory of Pakistan, and flowing into the Arabian Sea after galloping 3,600 kilometers. The Indus River became the cradle of ancient Indian civilization.
There is also the Ganges, the most sacred river in the eyes of Hindus, as the longest river in India, which originates from the Gengodri Glacier in Gankot on the southern slopes of the Himalayas, with a total length of 2,700 kilometers across northeast India. However, according to the international principle of determining that the source of the river is only far and the amount of water is only large, the true source of the Ganges should be the Jiazhagangga River in Ali, Tibet.
Hindus have four long-cherished wishes in life: to live in Varanasi, to make friends with saints, to drink the water of the Ganges and to worship Shiva
But in any case, the Ganga, known as "Ganga", is a holy river that Indians yearn for, according to legend: Sage Baikirada slept in the Himalayas all year round, and his piety and perseverance touched the goddess Ganga in heaven, and the goddess descended on Lord Shiva, flowed down the hair of the god to earth, and became the holy river - the Ganges.
Every 12 years in India, the "Palace Baku Meeting", the holy water bathing festival of the Ganges
So for thousands of years, the Ganges flowed like blood in the hearts of Hindus, receiving their worship. The annual "Kung Baku Meeting", the holy water bathing festival of the Ganges, has been held every 12 years for more than 2,000 years, and devout Hindus have been baptized, worshiped and bathed and welcomed death on the banks of the Ganges. The Ganges became their tender cradle and their cold graveyard.
Three-dimensional reality view of the Brahmaputra River and Nanga Bawa Peak Satellite. Satellite source: Sky Map
The Brahmaputra River, which originates from the Jemayangzong glacier in the northern foothills of the Himalayas, is the longest plateau river in China and one of the highest rivers in the world, the upper reaches are called the Maquan River, which crosses southern Tibet from west to east, and then turns south at the southernmost Nanga Bawa Peak at the easternmost tip of the Himalayas, passes through southern Tibet and enters the Indian state of Assam, renamed Brahmaputra River and finally merges with the Ganges River in Bangladesh and flows into the Bay of Bengal, which also forms the world's largest estuarine delta.
Nanga Bawa Peak, the easternmost peak of the Himalayas, is 7,782 meters above sea level, and at the foot of the mountain is the rushing Brahmaputra River.
The Grand Canyon at the bend of the Brahmaputra River is the deepest and longest Grand Canyon in the world, with extremely rich water energy reserves, and its total amount is second only to the Yangtze River in China. In addition, as the largest river on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, although the Yarlung Zangbo River accounts for only about 20% of Tibet's basin area, it supports almost half of Tibet's total population, and its arable land and grain output account for nearly eighty percent of Tibet, making it the cradle of the birth and development of Tibetan civilization.
Brahmaputra River Gorge
Ultra-high vertical drop creates a variety of vitality
Ancient glaciers, heavy snow and rivers that originate are not all there is to the Himalayas. In this third pole closest to the sky, there are both Mount Everest at the top of the world, and plain canyons only a few hundred meters above sea level, with an ultra-high vertical drop of 8,000 meters, giving the Himalayas a three-dimensional and diverse vegetation community structure and unique ecosystem, which also creates the most complete vertical distribution zone of mountain vegetation on the continent.
The Brahmaputra Grand Canyon cuts through the vast topographic barrier of the Himalayas, allowing warm and humid air currents from the Indian Ocean to enter the plateau and nurture a tropical monsoon forest
From Baxika, the "rainy capital of China" in Metuo County in the east, with an annual precipitation of more than 5,000 mm, to the semi-arid zone of less than 150 mm in Pakistan, the permanent snow line gradually rises from 4,800 meters in the east to about 5,800 meters in the western Himalayas as the precipitation decreases. The most direct manifestation of this series of changes is the composition of surface vegetation, such as the gradual transition of the vegetation base zone at the foot of the mountain from the tropical rainforest in the east to the stout bi-monial rainforest in the middle, and then to the dry deciduous forest in the west, which contains almost all typical vegetation belt types from the equator to the Arctic.
The Indo-Tibetan cultural circle distributed around the Himalayas
This is the Himalayas, and the silent world of ice and snow is not the whole of this huge mountain range, because glaciers make the source of rivers, and they play a sacred position in the animistic pan-god reverence, and then become the birthplace of Indo-Tibetan culture, which still affects hundreds of millions of people around the mountain range today.
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Note: This article is the 6th chapter of the "China-India Actual Control Boundary" series, which is only a word of the family, welcome to correct and forward. In addition, the accompanying picture in the article is quoted from the geographical commune, if there is a copyright private link, please delete.