China sets up World’s Highest Automatic Weather Station
Chinese scientific researchers established the world’s highest automatic meteorological monitoring station on Mount Qomolangma on the China-Nepal border.
Chinese scientific researchers on Wednesday established an automatic meteorological monitoring station at an altitude of over 8800 metres, making it the world’s highest of its kind, on Mount Qomolangma on the China-Nepal border.
It has replaced the station sitting at an altitude of 8430 metres on the south side of the mountain, set up by British and U.S scientists in 2019, to become the world’s highest, according to the Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research (ITP) under the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS).
Including the new weather station, eight elevation gradient meteorological stations have been set up on Mount Qomolangma -- one of the main tasks in China’s new comprehensive scientific expedition on the world’s highest peak at a height of 8848.86 metres.
Zhao Huabiao, a researcher with the ITP, said the monitored meteorological data would support scientific research and mountaineering activities.
Also on Wednesday, 13 members of the expedition team reached the summit of Mount Qomolangma.
At the summit, the squad measured the thickness of the ice and snow using high-accuracy radar for the first time, and collected samples for further research.
Taking research to new heights
The new comprehensive scientific expedition on Mount Qomolangma, as part of China’s second scientific research survey of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, is the country’s first scientific research above an altitude of 8000 metres on the peak.
More than 270 scientific research members from five teams are participating in the expedition.
The glacier and pollutant research team led by Kang Shichang, a researcher with the Northwest
Institute of Eco-Environment and Resources under CAS, will spend a month monitoring pollutants, the Rongbuk glacier and ice lake changes, as well as the greenhouse gas emissions from rivers and lakes covering the high-altitude area from the Mount Qomolangma base camp to the East Rongbuk glacier.