Mount Everest is the world's premier mountain and is located in Nepal. It's one of those facts that are ingrained in childhood, like the fact that Neil Armstrong was the first person to walk on the moon or the fact that blue whales are the largest animals ever to have lived.
You might be surprised to hear that other peaks could be considered the tallest on Earth.
The tallest mountain in the world is based on being the farthest point from Earth's center.
Why don't mountains grow forever?
Mount Everest is the most famous mountain in the world and is located in the Himalayas. Everest was first climbed in May of 1953 by Tenzing Norgay and Edmund Hillary, and has since been successfully climbed by over 4,000 people. Over 300 people have died on the mountain since 1922, according to the Guardian.
Mount Everest has been measured many times over the past few decades, but the most recent assessment puts it at 29,031.69 feet above sea level. It's a pretty impressive height, but it raises a question: Why do we use "above sea level" when determining the world's tallest peak?
Martin Price, a professor and founding director of the Centre for Mountain Studies at the University of Highlands and Islands in Scotland, told Live Science that it is necessary to have a consistent baseline in order to have comparability.
Price told Live Science that elevation is usually given as height above mean sea level. This has to be with reference to a standard mean sea level. Climate change is changing the sea levels in different parts of the world.
He said that elevation is now measured in relation to the Earth's geological features. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration says that the model of global mean sea level is used to measure precise surface elevations. This average is used to determine the height of mountains, a process that sometimes requires an airplane to fly back and forth over a mountain in a series of parallel lines to measure how much gravity pulls down on its peak, according to GIM International. Accurate elevation readings can be provided by these measurements in conjunction with gps readings.
The Big Island of Hawaii has an observatory. Westend61 is the image credit.
All mountains are measured from sea level for convenience and consistency, but what if they were simply taken from base to peak? Is Everest still the top climber?
The answer is not a mountain. The honor would go to the inactive volcano in Hawaii. Although its peak is less than half the height of Everest, the majority of Mauna Kea is hidden below sea level. According to the United States Geological Survey, the peak of Mauna Kea is 33,497 feet tall, making it heads and shoulders above Mount Everest.
Should we think of Mauna Kea as the tallest mountain on Earth?
"It all depends on your perspective," Price said. There would be no debate if there were no oceans. You could compare the highest mountains on other bodies in our solar system, which have no oceans.
The Mount is very close to the equator. The image is courtesy of boydhendrikse.
The farthest point from Earth's center is Mount Chimborazo in Ecuador.
It's not the tallest mountain in the Andes, but it's close to the equator, which makes a difference. Earth is an oblate spheroid and it bulges along the equator. The force created by Earth's rotation resulted in this. There is a difference of over 20 miles between the planet's polar and equatorial regions.
The geographical quirk means that Chimborazo's summit is 6,798 feet away from the planet's core.
Which one of these three should take home the first prize?
Mount Everest is the tallest mountain above sea level, while Mauna Kea can claim to be the world's tallest mountain, when sea level isn't taken into account. It would be difficult to make a case for Chimborazo being the tallest.
The height of the mountain will pale in comparison to the largest known volcano in the solar system. It is almost three times taller than Everest and has the same distance between San Francisco and Los Angeles as Everest.
The asteroid belt is 100 million miles from Earth and has an impact crater called Rheasilvia. The peak at the center of the crater is believed to be between 20 and 25 km in height, which is the tallest mountain in the solar system.
Live Science published the original article.
