The Lena-Angara Plateau ( rus, Лено-Ангарское плато),BRE - ЛЕ́НО-АНГА́РСКОЕ ПЛАТО́
/ref> is a

plateau In geology and physical geography, a plateau (; ; ), also called a high plain or a tableland, is an area of a highland consisting of flat terrain that is raised sharply above the surrounding area on at least one side. Often one or more sides ...

Siberia Siberia ( ; rus, Сибирь, r=Sibir', p=sʲɪˈbʲirʲ, a=Ru-Сибирь.ogg) is an extensive geographical region, constituting all of North Asia, from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east. It has been a part ...

. Administratively it is in the

Irkutsk Oblast Irkutsk Oblast (russian: Ирку́тская о́бласть, Irkutskaya oblast; bua, Эрхүү можо, Erkhüü mojo) is a federal subject of Russia (an oblast), located in southeastern Siberia in the basins of the Angara, Lena, and N ...

Russian Federation Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and Northern Asia. It is the largest country in the world, with its internationally recognised territory covering , and encompassing one-eig ...

. The plateau is named after the

Lena Lena or LENA may refer to: Places * Léna Department, a department of Houet Province in Burkina Faso * Lena, Manitoba, an unincorporated community located in Killarney-Turtle Mountain municipality in Manitoba, Canada * Lena, Norway, a village in ...

and

Angara The Angara ( Buryat and mn, Ангар, ''Angar'', "Cleft"; russian: Ангара́, ''Angará'') is a major river in Siberia, which traces a course through Russia's Irkutsk Oblast and Krasnoyarsk Krai. It drains out of Lake Baikal and is ...

rivers, of which it forms the

watershed Watershed is a hydrological term, which has been adopted in other fields in a more or less figurative sense. It may refer to: Hydrology * Drainage divide, the line that separates neighbouring drainage basins * Drainage basin, called a "watershe ...

. Rivers on the plateau flow mostly in a south–north direction.

Google Earth Google Earth is a computer program that renders a 3D computer graphics, 3D representation of Earth based primarily on satellite imagery. The program maps the Earth by superimposition, superimposing satellite images, aerial photography, and geog ...

The plateau has rich mining areas where iron and copper ores are extracted, as well as rock-salt, talc and mica. The Lena-Angara Plateau is mostly sparsely populated. The biggest settlements are Ust-Kut,

Kirensk Kirensk ( rus, Киренск, p=ˈkʲirʲɪnsk) is a town and the administrative center of Kirensky District in Irkutsk Oblast, Russia, located at the confluence of the Kirenga and Lena Rivers, north of Irkutsk, the administrative center of th ...

Zheleznogorsk-Ilimsky Zheleznogorsk-Ilimsky ( rus, Железногорск-Илимский, p=ʐɪlʲɪznɐˈgorsk ɪˈlʲimskʲɪj) is a town and the administrative center of Nizhneilimsky District of Irkutsk Oblast, Russia, located north of Irkutsk, the administ ...

, as well as the villages of Zhigalovo and Kachug. The

Bratsk Reservoir Bratsk Reservoir (russian: Бра́тское водохрани́лище, ''Bratskoye Reservoir'') is a reservoir on the Angara River, located in the Lena-Angara Plateau of Irkutsk Oblast, Russia. It is named after the city of Bratsk, the larges ...

is located in the plateau area.

Geography

The Lena-Angara Plateau rises in the middle part of Irkutsk Oblast, between the

Angara River The Angara ( Buryat and mn, Ангар, ''Angar'', "Cleft"; russian: Ангара́, ''Angará'') is a major river in Siberia, which traces a course through Russia's Irkutsk Oblast and Krasnoyarsk Krai. It drains out of Lake Baikal and is ...

to the west and the

Kirenga The Kirenga () is a river in Irkutsk Oblast in Russia. The name originated in an Evenki word. The length of the river is . The area of its basin is . There are many settlements in the river valley. The Baikal Amur Mainline follows and crosses ...

River, a tributary of the Lena, to the east. To the northwest it is bound by the

Angara Range The Angara Range (russian: Ангарский кряж) is a mountain range in Krasnoyarsk Krai and Irkutsk Oblast, Russia, part of the Central Siberian Plateau.Google Earth There are large iron ore deposits in the area of the Angara Range. Geo ...

, to the south by the

valley, to the southeast by the

Primorsky Range The Primorsky Range (russian: Приморский хребет) is a range of mountains in Southern Siberia, part of the South Siberian Mountains. Administratively the range belongs to the Irkutsk Oblast, Federal subjects of Russia, Russian Feder ...

, and to the east by the

Baikal Range The Baikal Mountains or Baikal Range (russian: Байкальский хребет, ''Bajkaljskij hrebet''; bua, Байгалай дабаан, ''Baigalai dabaan'') are a mountain range that rises steeply over the northwestern shore of Lake Baik ...

, beyond which lies

Lake Baikal Lake Baikal (, russian: Oзеро Байкал, Ozero Baykal ); mn, Байгал нуур, Baigal nuur) is a rift lake in Russia. It is situated in southern Siberia, between the federal subjects of Irkutsk Oblast to the northwest and the ...

. To the north the Lena-Angara Plateau merges with the

Central Siberian Plateau The Central Siberian Plateau (russian: Среднесибирское плоскогорье, Srednesibirskoye ploskogorye; sah, Орто Сибиир хаптал хайалаах сирэ) is a vast mountainous area in Siberia, one of the Gre ...

. It extends roughly for over with a maximum width of . The average height of the plateau surface is in the south, decreasing to an average of in the north. Mountaintops are flat and elevations moderate; the highest point is the Namai, a high summit. This same mountain, however, is marked as a peak in the E-8 sheet of the

Defense Mapping Agency The National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) is a combat support agency within the United States Department of Defense whose primary mission is collecting, analyzing, and distributing geospatial intelligence (GEOINT) in support of nationa ...

Navigation charts.URSS 1,000,000 scale Operational Navigation Chart; Sheet E-8
/ref> The same peak is shown as a summit in the N-48 sheet of the Soviet Topographic Map.

Hydrography

The plateau is dissected by deep river valleys with average depths ranging between and . The upper course of river Lena crosses the plateau roughly from south to north. Its tributaries

Ilga Ilga or ILGA may refer to: * Ilga (river), a river in Russia, tributary of the Lena * International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association, or ILGA * Illinois General Assembly, in the United States * Ilga, a Latvian feminine given na ...

Tutura The Tutura (russian: Тутура) is a river in Irkutsk Oblast, Russia. It is a tributary of the Lena with a length of and a drainage basin area of . The settlement of Chikan is located by the Tutura, near the confluence with the Chikan riv ...

, Tayura and

Kuta Kuta is a tourist area, administratively an urban village (''kelurahan''), and the capital of Kuta District, Badung Regency, southern Bali, Indonesia. A former fishing village, it was one of the first towns on Bali to see substantial tourist de ...

join it in the plateau area.Лено-Ангарское плато
—

Great Soviet Encyclopedia The ''Great Soviet Encyclopedia'' (GSE; ) is one of the largest Russian-language encyclopedias, published in the Soviet Union from 1926 to 1990. After 2002, the encyclopedia's data was partially included into the later ''Bolshaya rossiyskaya e ...

in 30 vols. / Ch. ed. A.M. Prokhorov - 3rd ed. - M, 1969-1978. The plateau also includes highly developed

karst Karst is a topography formed from the dissolution of soluble rocks such as limestone, Dolomite (rock), dolomite, and gypsum. It is characterized by underground drainage systems with sinkholes and caves. It has also been documented for more weathe ...

forms such as the Botovskaya Cave.Kolesnikova E. ''Exploration of the longest limestone cave in Russia''. Svet, 1993, no. 4 (10). pp. 23-25

Flora

There are

taiga Taiga (; rus, тайга́, p=tɐjˈɡa; relates to Mongolic and Turkic languages), generally referred to in North America as a boreal forest or snow forest, is a biome characterized by coniferous forests consisting mostly of pines, sp ...

forests made up mostly of

larch Larches are deciduous conifers in the genus ''Larix'', of the family Pinaceae (subfamily Laricoideae). Growing from tall, they are native to much of the cooler temperate northern hemisphere, on lowlands in the north and high on mountains fur ...

spruce A spruce is a tree of the genus ''Picea'' (), a genus of about 35 species of coniferous evergreen trees in the family Pinaceae, found in the northern temperate and boreal (taiga) regions of the Earth. ''Picea'' is the sole genus in the subfam ...

and

Siberian pine ''Pinus sibirica'', or Siberian pine, in the family Pinaceae is a species of pine tree that occurs in Siberia from 58°E in the Ural Mountains east to 126°E in the Stanovoy Range in southern Sakha Republic, and from Igarka at 68°N in the lower ...

in the higher areas and larch in the river valleys.

References

{{Reflist

External links

Physiogeography of the Russian Far East
Central Siberian Plateau Landforms of Irkutsk Oblast ru:Лено-Ангарское плато

Geography

Hydrography

Flora

See also

References

External links