AT close proximity from parallel 0°. What is this river that crosses the equator twice? What continent is the waterway on? This article provides detailed answers to fascinating

On which continent is the river that crosses the equator twice?

Usually, latitude is measured from the 0° parallel. This is the equator crossed by all meridians. An imaginary line on a globe and a map is a conditional border between the Northern and Southern hemispheres. Equator crosses:

• Africa - in the central part of this continent;
• South America- in the north;
• many large and small islands in the Pacific, Indian and Atlantic oceans.

Thousands of streams in these land areas flow near latitude 0°. But there's only one largest river, which crosses the equator twice - r. Congo on the African continent. The second largest and hottest in its northern part is very arid. The center of the mainland is located in the equatorial climatic zone, where precipitation is more than 2000 mm / year, but evaporation is also significant.

A huge area in this region is occupied by hylaea - moist evergreen forests (jungle). The western part of Central Africa is washed by the relatively cold waters of the Gulf of Guinea. To the north, the forest belt gradually turns into the endless expanses of the savannah. From the east and west, the Congo River basin is bounded by mountain ranges that serve as a watershed.

Congo is the largest river in Africa

The largest natural watercourses of the Atlantic Ocean basin have similarities and differences. On the African mainland, the rain type predominates in the feeding of such rivers. After all, the sources are in the equatorial regions, where there is a lot of precipitation. Nile - the longest water artery - begins in mountain ranges East Africa, flows north and empties into the Mediterranean Sea. crosses the equator or parallel 0° twice. It is easy to see this if you look at a map of the world or Africa. First, a stream from an area in the Southern Hemisphere heads north, taking in numerous tributaries along the way. The river turns southwest about 2° north of the equator. Congo returns to the Southern Hemisphere and rushes to the Gulf of Guinea. This is the most deep river which crosses the equator twice. Congo in terms of runoff in the world ranking is second only to the South American river. Amazon. On the maps of Africa, another hydronym is often indicated - Zaire. It so happened historically that the river has two names.

The Congo Basin is located in the subequatorial and equatorial climatic zones. The river receives numerous tributaries in the northern and southern hemispheres. The area south of the equator accounts for about 75% of the basin, which affects water regime. Thus, the level rise is observed from March to October, when the northern tributaries receive the most precipitation. The second peak occurs in October-March, when the wettest conditions occur south of the equator. The flow of the Congo River is uniform throughout the year. To this it is still necessary to add the presence of a significant drop in the channel, rapids and waterfalls in the upper reaches.

Deep Congo

Famous American edition national geographic leads comparative analysis high water content of the Earth's rivers. The first line is occupied by the Amazon, which crosses the mainland of South America from west to east. The African river, which crosses the equator twice, surpasses other water arteries of the planet explored by experts in depth. According to National Geographic, the depth of the Congo in some sections of the channel is more than 230 m. This is almost twice as much as that of the Amazon.

Geographers explain the considerable depth of the Congo by the structure of the channel and the entire river valley. The largest watercourse in Central Africa on its way to the Gulf of Guinea for thousands of years made its way through a gorge in a mountainous area. Now it is the South Guinean Plateau, where the Congo channel narrows to 300-500 m. But on the plain, the African river spills over 10-15 km. A powerful stream of water breaks into the gorge and fills it. The flow of the river in this section reaches a record high - 42 thousand m 3 / sec.

Exploration of the Congo Basin

The Portuguese merchant and navigator Diogo Can explored the western coast of Africa and the confluence of the Congo, and in 1482 discovered the sources in the mountains. The river crosses the equator twice Central Africa. long time this area was the least explored on the mainland, abounded in "white spots".

Impenetrable jungle, swampy terrain, lack of roads hampered the work of cartographers and other scientists. One of them compared the hylaea with a "green hell", because in the forest travelers had to fight their way with a machete with difficulty. Creepers rage around and do not allow to pass, powerful and numerous stilted roots grow. It is gloomy and damp under the forest canopy, because it rains almost every day, and the crowns of several tiers of trees and shrubs block out the light. Animals prefer to live and eat on branches, occasionally going down.

Main characteristics of the Congo River

Having learned which one crosses the equator twice, we can describe it in more detail. The length of the channel different estimates is 4.3-4.7 thousand km. A more accurate answer depends on which of the tributaries of the river is taken as its source. In general, the basin area reaches an impressive size - almost 3.7 million km 2. Most geographical publications name the river originating on the Shaba plateau as a source, west of the city Kisangani.

Congo on the way to Atlantic Ocean receives numerous left and right tributaries. The largest of them: Mobangi, Ruki, Lulongo and others. Significant differences between the height of the sources and the mouth, the fall and slope of the river on separate sections provide its huge hydroelectric potential. Several powerful hydroelectric power plants have been built, supplying energy to the Central African countries. The bottom is actively used for shipping, wood alloy. Fishing is developed, they hunt in the waters of the Congo Nile perch, freshwater herring.

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Did you know that there is a river that crosses the equator twice?

One of the largest natural watercourses of the Earth is located on the hottest mainland in the immediate vicinity of the 0° parallel. What is this river that crosses the equator twice? What continent is the waterway on? The proposed article provides detailed answers to fascinating geographical riddles.

On which continent is the river that crosses the equator twice?

Usually, latitude is measured from the 0° parallel. This is the equator crossed by all meridians. An imaginary line on a globe and a map is a conditional border between the Northern and Southern hemispheres. Equator crosses:

• Africa - in the central part of this continent;
• South America - in the north;
• many large and small islands in the Pacific, Indian and Atlantic oceans.

Thousands of streams in these land areas flow near latitude 0°. But there is only one largest river that crosses the equator twice - the river. Congo on the African continent. The second largest and hottest of the Earth's continents is very dry in its northern part. The center of the mainland is located in the equatorial climatic zone, where precipitation is more than 2000 mm / year, but evaporation is also significant.

A huge area in this region is occupied by hylaea - moist evergreen forests (jungle). The western part of Central Africa is washed by the relatively cold waters of the Gulf of Guinea. To the north, the forest belt gradually turns into the endless expanses of the savannah. From the east and west, the Congo River basin is bounded by mountain ranges that serve as a watershed.

Congo is the largest river in Africa

The largest natural watercourses of the Atlantic Ocean basin have similarities and differences. On the African mainland, the rain type predominates in the feeding of such rivers. After all, the sources are in the equatorial regions, where there is a lot of precipitation. The Nile, the longest waterway, begins in the mountains of East Africa, flows north and flows into the Mediterranean Sea. The Congo River crosses the equator or parallel 0° twice. It is easy to see this if you look at a map of the world or Africa. First, a stream from an area in the Southern Hemisphere heads north, taking in numerous tributaries along the way. The river turns southwest about 2° north of the equator. Congo returns to the Southern Hemisphere and rushes to the Gulf of Guinea. This is the most full-flowing river that crosses the equator twice. Congo in terms of runoff in the world ranking is second only to the South American river. Amazon. On the maps of Africa, another hydronym is often indicated - Zaire. It so happened historically that the river has two names.

The Congo Basin is located in the subequatorial and equatorial climatic zones. The river receives numerous tributaries in the northern and southern hemispheres. The region south of the equator accounts for about 75% of the basin, which affects the water regime. Thus, the level rise is observed from March to October, when the northern tributaries receive the most precipitation. The second peak occurs in October-March, when the wettest conditions occur south of the equator. The flow of the Congo River is uniform throughout the year. To this it is still necessary to add the presence of a significant drop in the channel, rapids and waterfalls in the upper reaches.

Related videos

Deep Congo

The well-known American publication National Geographic provides a comparative analysis of the high water content of the Earth's rivers. The first line is occupied by the Amazon, which crosses the mainland of South America from west to east. The African river, which crosses the equator twice, surpasses other water arteries of the planet explored by experts in depth. According to National Geographic, the depth of the Congo in some sections of the channel is more than 230 m. This is almost twice as much as that of the Amazon.

Geographers explain the considerable depth of the Congo by the structure of the channel and the entire river valley. The largest watercourse in Central Africa on its way to the Gulf of Guinea for thousands of years made its way through a gorge in a mountainous area. Now it is the South Guinean Plateau, where the Congo channel narrows to 300-500 m. But on the plain, the African river spills over 10-15 km. A powerful stream of water breaks into the gorge and fills it. The flow of the river in this section reaches a record high - 42 thousand m 3 / sec.

Exploration of the Congo Basin

The Portuguese merchant and navigator Diogo Kan explored the western coast of Africa and the place where the Congo flows into the Gulf of Guinea, and in 1482 he discovered sources in the mountains. The river crosses the equator twice in Central Africa. For a long time, this area was the least studied on the mainland, and was full of "white spots".

Impenetrable jungle, swampy terrain, lack of roads hampered the work of cartographers and other scientists. One of them compared the hylaea with a "green hell", because in the forest travelers had to fight their way with a machete with difficulty. Creepers rage around and do not allow to pass, powerful and numerous stilted roots grow. It is gloomy and damp under the forest canopy, because it rains almost every day, and the crowns of several tiers of trees and shrubs block out the light. Animals prefer to live and eat on branches, occasionally going down.

Main characteristics of the Congo River

Having learned which river of Africa crosses the equator twice, we can describe it in more detail. The length of the channel, according to various estimates, is 4.3-4.7 thousand km. A more accurate answer depends on which of the tributaries of the river is taken as its source. In general, the basin area reaches an impressive size - almost 3.7 million km 2. Most geographical publications name the river as a source, originating on the Shaba plateau, west of the city of Kisangani.

Congo on the way to the Atlantic Ocean receives numerous left and right tributaries. The largest of them: Mobangi, Ruki, Lulongo and others. Significant differences between the height of the sources and the mouth, the fall and slope of the river in some areas provide its huge hydropower potential. Several powerful hydroelectric power plants have been built, supplying energy to the Central African countries. Bottom part rivers are actively used for navigation, timber alloy. Fishing is developed, they hunt in the waters of the Congo Nile perch, freshwater herring.

Almost all of you have paid attention to the "mysterious lines" on maps and globes representing latitude (parallels) and longitude (meridians). They form a grid system of coordinates by which any place on Earth can be precisely defined - and there is nothing mysterious or complicated about it. Parallels and meridians are imaginary lines on the surface of the Earth, and latitude and longitude are their coordinates that determine the position of points on the surface of the Earth. Any point on Earth is the intersection of a parallel and a meridian with coordinates of latitude and longitude. This can be most clearly studied with the help of a globe, where these lines are indicated.
But first, everything is in order. Two places on Earth are determined by its rotation around own axis- This Northern and South Pole a. On globes, the pivot is the axis. North Pole located in the North Arctic Ocean which is covered sea ​​ice, and researchers in old days reached this pole on a sleigh with dogs (it is officially believed that the North Pole was discovered in 1909 by the American Robert Peri). However, since the ice moves slowly, the North Pole is not an actual, but rather a mathematical entity. The South Pole, on the other side of the planet, has a permanent physical location on the continent of Antarctica, which was also discovered by land explorers (Norwegian expedition led by Roald Amundsen in 1911).

Halfway between the poles at the "waist" of the Earth is a large circle line, which is represented on the globe as a seam: the junction of the northern and southern hemispheres; this circle line is called - equator. The equator is a line of latitude with zero value(0°). Parallel to the equator above and below it are other lines of the circle - these are other latitudes of the Earth. Each latitude has a numerical value, and the scale of these values ​​is not measured in kilometers, but in degrees north and south of the equator to the poles. The poles have meanings: North +90°, and South -90°. Latitudes above the equator are called northern latitudes, and below the equator southern latitudes. Lines with degrees of latitude are called parallels, since they run parallel to the Equator and are parallel to each other. If parallels are measured in kilometers, then the lengths of different parallels will be different - they increase when approaching the equator and decrease towards the poles. All points of the same parallel have the same latitude, but different longitudes (the description of longitude is just below). The distance between two parallels that differ by 1° is 111.11 km. On the globe, as well as on many maps, the distance (interval) from a latitude to another latitude is usually 15° (that's about 1,666 km). In figure No. 1, the interval is 10 ° (this is approximately 1,111 km). The equator is the longest parallel, its length is 40,075.7 km.

Thus, the equator is crossed by the following oceans - Indian, Pacific and Atlantic. But the continents that cross the equator are Africa and South America. The Equator divides the globe into the North and southern hemisphere, and serves as the starting point geographical latitude. Only two continents cross the equator.

And for that we need a map and an idea of ​​what the equator is. Then the equator crosses Indian Ocean approaching our starting point. The equator does not affect Asia at any point, being limited to the nearest islands - the Maldives and Indonesia, which owns the island of Sumatra, from which we began our round-the-world trip.

These include our hottest continents, Africa and South America. As for the oceans, here we can say that three oceans cross the equator. The active volcano Wolf in Ecuador is located on both sides of the equator. The Brazilian city of Macapa is located simultaneously in the northern and southern hemispheres.

From Marco Zero to the east, almost to the coast of the Amazon along the equator line, there is an "Equatorial Street" (port.Avenida Equatorial). The second part of the task is related to the first and is easily solved by estimating the position of each of the continents in relation to the equator line. This line is drawn, albeit conditionally, but not unreasonably.

The equator is the main and longest parallel of our planet, the latitude of which is 0 degrees. The continents that cross the equator are traditionally considered to be "southern". There are only two of them - South America and Africa.

What is the equator?

So, he “cuts through” South America in its northern part. The equator divides Africa almost in half. And this fact was reflected in the peculiarities of the nature of the "black continent". The equator also passes through the territory of twelve independent states. In many countries, in places where the zero parallel passes, corresponding signs and monuments have been erected.

From the monument, a line is drawn directly on the ground, which divides the planet into the Northern and Southern hemispheres. True, few travelers know that true line equator passes 240 meters from the popular attraction. Along the equator are countries with the warmest equatorial climate on Earth.

Equator: characteristics

In America, the equator passes through the territory of Ecuador, Colombia and Brazil (the states of Amazonas, Roraima, Para, Amapa). The word "equator" appears in the names of 2 states - Ecuador 2 and Equatorial Guinea. If the equator is the natural baseline for latitude, then there is no equally obvious equivalent for longitude. Very often you can hear in everyday conversations how the mainland is called the concept of "part of the world."

Equator as a cultural attraction

Part of the world are land regions, which include both the continents themselves and adjacent islands. In total, six parts of the world are known, including Australia and Oceania, America, Asia, Europe, Africa, and Antarctica. The concepts of "part of the world" and "mainland" are also distinguished by another feature. It is worth noting that the division into parts of the world should not be confused with the "New" and "Old" world.

Click and save. After the discovery of America by Europeans, the Spaniards and the Portuguese began to move to the mainland. Slaves from Africa were brought to the mainland to work on the plantations. The population across the mainland is distributed unevenly. The nature of Antarctica is not rich and unique. 1. The nature of which of these continents should be more diverse? In addition to size, the shape of the continent, its length, especially meridional, also affects the diversity of nature.

That's actually all. Nothing else crosses the equator, although it may touch the Indian Ocean a little more. The equator crosses Africa almost in the middle. Further, the equator crosses the Indian Ocean, passing through the territorial seas of the Maldives, the seas and islands of Indonesia. By the way, along the equator line there are the hottest countries, including those on the islands. Zero parallel of the Earth crosses various countries and seas, continents and oceans.

The need to accurately locate earth's surface one’s own and surrounding objects has become especially relevant for a person with the onset active research planets.
Geographical coordinates- latitude and longitude - are determined by the intersection point of two imaginary lines - the parallel and the meridian. The longest parallel from which latitude begins is the equator.

origin of name

An imaginary line, which is formed by points located at the same distance from both poles, divides the planet into two hemispheres, two hemispheres. The word for the name of such a border has ancient roots. The Latin aequator, equalizer, is derived from the verb aequō, to equalize. The "equator" entered international practice from German language, from Äquator.

This word has more general meaning. In geometry, a three-dimensional body, which has both an axis and a plane of symmetry mutually perpendicular, has its own equator, its longest parallel - the intersection of the surface of the given body with the plane of symmetry. In astronomy, the celestial equator, the magnetic equator of a planet or star are known.

Earth is a geoid

The belief that the Earth has the shape of a flat disk was questioned only by ancient Greek scientists. To late XIX century, it became clear that the shape of our planet is not just an ideal ball, but a special body of revolution - the geoid, the surface of which is influenced by many factors - from gravity to "cosmic wind". Two points of the geoid are determined by its axis of rotation - these are the North and South Poles. On the equal distance from them is the longest parallel on Earth, the earth's "waist" - the equator.

But the geoid does not accurately, but only approximately describes the shape of the planet. Such it would be in the absence of mountains and depressions, if there were only a calm, undisturbed surface of the oceans. This level plays important role in navigation and geodesy - from it a report of vertical marks for various technical and engineering objects is kept.

Equator length

You can understand which parallel is the longest specific values geometric measurements of the geoid. The radius of the equator, as a circle, "drawn" on the surface of the Earth, equal to the radius planets. Accurate measurements show that this parameter differs in different points planets - the polar radius is 21.3 km less than the equatorial one. average value- 6371 km

Using the formula for the circumference of a circle - 2πR - you can calculate the length of the equator. Different geophysical standards determine the figures with a difference of about 3 m, on average - 40075 km. along the meridian - 40,007 km, which proves the special geometric qualities of the geoid.

Zero latitude

The coordinate grid that covers the globe - visual model the globe, - form 360 meridians connecting the two poles, and 180 lines parallel to the equator, distributed in 90 pieces to the poles, on both sides of it. Since 1884, the meridian drawn through the English capital, located in the southeast, is considered to be the beginning of the longitude count. The longest parallel dividing the northern and southern hemispheres is the origin of latitude.

Coordinates are angular values ​​and are measured in degrees. Longitude - the angle between the plane passing through the zero - Greenwich - meridian and the one indicated by the line connecting the earth's poles and drawn through given point. To the east of Greenwich to 180 ° longitude is called east and is considered positive, to the west - it has negative values and is called Western.

Points equidistant from the poles form the equatorial plane. The radius drawn from the center of the globe through a given point on its surface forms an angle with this plane, the magnitude of which is the latitude. The longest parallel has zero latitude. To the north of the equator, this angle is considered positive - from 0 ° to 90 °, to the south - negative.

Signs and rituals

The equator is only an illusory border between the two hemispheres, but it has always stirred the human imagination. The sailors different countries it is customary to observe special rituals when crossing zero latitude, especially for those who do it for the first time. Where the equator passes inhabited places, special signs and structures are invariably erected to make the conditional line real. A rare tourist will miss the opportunity to stand with one foot in the South, and the other in It is impossible to forget after that, as the longest parallel of the globe is called.

But the equatorial zones of the Earth have other unique characteristics that give them special value. The gravitational pull here is slightly less than at other latitudes, and the rotational momentum of the globe is greater. This allows you to save a lot on withdrawals. spaceships into orbit. It is no coincidence that it is in equatorial French Guiana, on the South American coast, that the most effective launch space complex, the Kourou cosmodrome, is located.