The Upper Angara (, ''Verkhnyaya Angara''; , ''Deede Angar'') is a river in
Buryatia
Buryatia, officially the Republic of Buryatia, is a republic of Russia located in the Russian Far East. Formerly part of the Siberian Federal District, it has been administered as part of the Far Eastern Federal District since 2018. To its nort ...
,
Siberia
Siberia ( ; , ) is an extensive geographical region comprising all of North Asia, from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east. It has formed a part of the sovereign territory of Russia and its predecessor states ...
to the northeast of
Lake Baikal
Lake Baikal is a rift lake and the deepest lake in the world. It is situated in southern Siberia, Russia between the Federal subjects of Russia, federal subjects of Irkutsk Oblast, Irkutsk Oblasts of Russia, Oblast to the northwest and the Repu ...
. the third longest river in the Baikal basin. It is long, and has a
drainage basin
A drainage basin is an area of land in which all flowing surface water converges to a single point, such as a river mouth, or flows into another body of water, such as a lake or ocean. A basin is separated from adjacent basins by a perimeter, ...
of .
[ (Upper Angara River)]
The
Baikal–Amur Mainline runs along the north side of the river northeast up its valley, crossing between Anamakit and
Novy Uoyan and crossing the river a second time upstream before heading into the mountains.
Wikimapia approximate site of basin
/ref>
Course
The Upper Angara rises at about in an area of small glacial lake
A glacial lake is a body of water with origins from glacier activity. They are formed when a glacier erodes the land and then melts, filling the depression created by the glacier.
Formation
Near the end of the last glacial period, roughly 10,0 ...
s of the Delyun-Uran range, right by the Northern Muya Range, Stanovoy Highlands
The Stanovoy Highlands () or Stanovoy Uplands is a mountain range in the Transbaikal region of Siberia, Russia.
Geography
The Stanovoy Highlands are a mountainous area between the Patom Highlands to the north and the Vitim Plateau to the south. ...
. It its upper course the river flows in a WSW direction across mountainous terrain, with rapids
Rapids are sections of a river where the river bed has a relatively steep stream gradient, gradient, causing an increase in water velocity and turbulence. Flow, gradient, constriction, and obstacles are four factors that are needed for a rapid t ...
and waterfalls. It enters then a floodplain
A floodplain or flood plain or bottomlands is an area of land adjacent to a river. Floodplains stretch from the banks of a river channel to the base of the enclosing valley, and experience flooding during periods of high Discharge (hydrolog ...
and crosses the spurs of the Upper Angara and the Barguzin ranges. Near Yanchukan it flows through the Upper Angara tectonic basin. Finally it ends in Lake Baikal forming a delta in the shallow northern end of the lake, separated from the deep part by long sandy spits, including Yarki Island. The Upper Angara is navigable in its last stretch.[Верхняя Ангара - Water of Russia]
''water-rf.ru''
The main tributaries of the Upper Angara are the long Angarakan, the long Yanchui, the long Churo and the long Kotera.[
]
See also
*List of rivers of Russia
Russia can be divided into a European and an Asian part. The dividing line is generally considered to be the Ural Mountains. The European part is drained into the Arctic Ocean, Baltic Sea, Black Sea, and Caspian Sea. The Asian part is drained i ...
References
External links
* .
Rivers of Buryatia
Stanovoy Highlands
{{FarEast-Russia-river-stub