The World’s Most Amazing Mountains

The World’s Most Amazing Mountains

By Mr Ghaz, September 24, 2010

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The World’s Most Amazing Mountains

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A mountain is defined as an upward projection of the Earth’s surface with an altitude of at least 600m (1968 ft). Most major mountain ranges from where two of the Earth’s plates push together, which is also where most volcanoes occur. The process that produced mountains are collectively called orogenesis, from ‘oros’ meaning mountain, and ‘genesis’, to come into being. There are three types of mountain – fold, fault-block, and volcanic. Weathering and erosion, especially by glaciers, gradually break up a range and create individual peaks. Individual mountains that are not part of a range are known as monarchs.

The Andes

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The range is one of the youngest. It began forming 4.5 million years ago.

The Andes run almost the entire length of South America. The system is divided into two parallel ranges; the older eastern range: the Cordillera Oriental, and the younger, western range, the Cordillera Occidental. They are separated by a high-altitude plateau called the Altiplano.

Types of Mountains

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Fold Mountains form where layers of folded rock are pushed upwards along the edge of a continental plate as two plates collide. Most mountains formed this way, including the Alps, Himalayas and Appalachians.

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Fault-Block Mountains are formed by the displacement of rock along a fault in the Earth’s crust. The Sierra Nevada in California, the Grand Tetons in Wyoming, and the mountains along the East African Rift Valley formed this way.

Old and New