The Tanggula ( Chinese: , p ''Tánggǔlāshān'', or , p ''Tánggǔlāshānmài''), Tangla, Tanglha, or Dangla Mountains (

Tibetan Tibetan may mean: * of, from, or related to Tibet * Tibetan people, an ethnic group * Tibetan language: ** Classical Tibetan, the classical language used also as a contemporary written standard ** Standard Tibetan, the most widely used spoken diale ...

: , w ''Gdang La'', z ''Dang La'') are a mountain range in the central part of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau in

Tibet Tibet (; ''Böd''; ) is a region in East Asia, covering much of the Tibetan Plateau and spanning about . It is the traditional homeland of the Tibetan people. Also resident on the plateau are some other ethnic groups such as Monpa people, ...

, China. Administratively, the range is in the

Nagqu Prefecture Nagqu (also Naqu, Nakchu, or Nagchu; ; ) is a prefecture-level city in the north of the Chinese autonomous region of Tibet. On May 7, 2018, the former Nagqu Prefecture was officially declared the sixth prefecture-level city in Tibet after Lhasa, ...

of the

Tibet Autonomous Region The Tibet Autonomous Region or Xizang Autonomous Region, often shortened to Tibet or Xizang, is a province-level autonomous region of the People's Republic of China in Southwest China. It was overlayed on the traditional Tibetan regions ...

, with the central section extending into nearby

Tanggula Town Tanggulashan (, ), or Dangla Town, is a town in the southwest of Qinghai province, China. It forms the southern exclave of the county-level city of Golmud, in Haixi Mongol and Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, partially administrated by Amdo County, ...

and the eastern section entering the

Yushu Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture Yushu Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture (, , retranscribed into Tibetan as ), also transliterated as Yüxü or Yulshul, is an autonomous prefecture of Southwestern Qinghai Province, China. Largely inhabited by Tibetans, the prefecture has an area of ...

Qinghai Qinghai (; alternately romanized as Tsinghai, Ch'inghai), also known as Kokonor, is a landlocked province in the northwest of the People's Republic of China. It is the fourth largest province of China by area and has the third smallest po ...

province A province is almost always an administrative division within a country or state. The term derives from the ancient Roman ''provincia'', which was the major territorial and administrative unit of the Roman Empire's territorial possessions out ...

. The Tanggula is the source of the Ulan Moron and

Dangqu River The Dangqu (Chinese: , p ''Dāngqū'') or Dam Chu ( Tibetan: , w Dam Chu'', lit. "Marshy River") is a river in Qinghai province in the People's Republic of China. It is the geographic headwater of the Yangtze River, al ...

s, the geographic headwaters of the

Yangtze River The Yangtze or Yangzi ( or ; ) is the longest river in Asia, the third-longest in the world, and the longest in the world to flow entirely within one country. It rises at Jari Hill in the Tanggula Mountains (Tibetan Plateau) and flows ...

. The range thus functions as a dividing range between the basin of the Yangtze in the north and the

endorheic basin An endorheic basin (; also spelled endoreic basin or endorreic basin) is a drainage basin that normally retains water and allows no outflow to other external bodies of water, such as rivers or oceans, but drainage converges instead into lakes ...

s of north-eastern Tibet in the south.

Overview

The elevations of the main ridge average more than . The Yangtze River originates in this mountain range; Geladandong, high, located in

, is the tallest peak in the range. The Qinghai-Tibet Highway and the Qinghai-Tibet Railway cross the Tanggula Mountains at

Tanggula Mountain Pass The Tanggu La, Tangla Pass, or Tanggu Pass (; bo, གདང་ལ) is a wide mountain pass in Southwest China over in elevation, which utilized by both the Qinghai–Tibet Highway and Qinghai–Tibet Railway to cross the Tanggula Mountains. T ...

. This is the highest point of the Qinghai-Tibet Railway, and the highest point of any railway in the world, at above sea level. On account of snow and occasional road accidents, highway closures and concomitant traffic delays are not uncommon. The mountains lie within the

Tibetan Plateau alpine shrub and meadows The Tibetan Plateau alpine shrublands and meadows ecoregion covers the middle transition zone between the northern and southern regions of the Tibetan Plateau. The region supports both cold alpine steppe and meadows across a broad expanse of the ...

ecoregion An ecoregion (ecological region) or ecozone (ecological zone) is an ecologically and geographically defined area that is smaller than a bioregion, which in turn is smaller than a biogeographic realm. Ecoregions cover relatively large areas of ...

References

Mountain ranges of Tibet {{tibet-geo-stub

Overview

See also

References