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Extreme points of Earth

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This is a list of extreme points of Earth, the

geographical locations that are farther north or
south than, higher or lower in elevation than, or
farthest inland or out to sea from, any other
locations on the landmasses, continents or
countries.

For other lists of extreme points on Earth,

including places that hold temperature and
weather records, see Extremes on Earth, Lists
of extreme points, and List of weather records.

Earth …

Latitude and longitude

…
The northernmost point on Earth is the
Geographic North Pole, in the Arctic Ocean.
The northernmost point on land is the
northern tip of Kaffeklubben Island,
north of Greenland (83°40′N 29°50′W),
which lies slightly north of Cape Morris
Jesup, Greenland (83°38′N 32°40′W).
Various shifting gravel bars lie farther
north, the most famous being Oodaaq.
There has been other islands more
northern such as 83-42 and ATOW1996
but they are not confirmed as
permanent.

The southernmost point on Earth and the

southernmost point on land is the
geographic South Pole, which is on the
continent of Antarctica.
The southernmost point of water is a
bay on the Filchner-Ronne Ice Shelf
along the coast of Antarctica (83°S
59°W)[citation needed] about 100 km
(62 mi) south of Berkner Island, the
southernmost island in the world. The
southernmost point of ocean is
located on the Gould Coast (84°30′S
150°0′W);[citation needed][1] the
southernmost point of open ocean is
also part of the Ross Sea, namely the
Bay of Whales at 78°30'S, at the edge of
the Ross Ice Shelf.[2]

The westernmost and easternmost points

on Earth, based on the east–west standard
for describing longitude, can be found
anywhere along the 180th meridian in Siberia
(including Wrangel Island), Antarctica, or the
three islands of Fiji through which the 180th
meridian passes (Vanua Levu's eastern
peninsula, the middle of Taveuni, and the
western part of Rabi Island).
Using the path of the International Date
Line, the westernmost point on land is
Attu Island, Alaska, and the
easternmost point on land is Caroline
Island, Kiribati.[note 1]

Elevation
…
See also: List of elevation extremes by region, List of
elevation extremes by country, and Extremes on Earth

Highest points
…

Chimborazo in Ecuador is the

farthest point from Earth's centre.

The highest point on Earth's surface

measured from sea level is the summit of
Mount Everest on the border of Nepal and
China. While measurements of its height
vary slightly, the elevation of its peak is
usually given as 8,848 m (29,029 ft) above
sea level. It was first reached by Sir Edmund
Hillary of New Zealand and Sherpa of Nepal
Tenzing Norgay in 1953.

The point farthest from Earth's centre is

the summit of Chimborazo[3] in Ecuador, at
6,384.4 km (3,967.1 mi) from Earth's centre;
the peak's elevation relative to sea level is
6,263.47 m (20,549 ft).[note 2] This is
because Earth is an oblate spheroid rather
than a perfect sphere; it is wider at the
Equator and narrower between the poles.
Therefore, the summit of Chimborazo, which
is near the Equator, is farther away from
Earth's centre than the summit of Mount
Everest is; the latter is 2,168 m (7,112.9 ft)
closer, at 6,382.3 km (3,965.8 mi) from
Earth's centre. Peru's Huascarán (at 6,768 m
or 22,205 ft) contends closely with
Chimborazo, the difference in the mountains'
heights being just 23 m (75 ft).

The fastest point on Earth or, in other

words, the point furthest from the axis of
Earth is the summit of Cayambe[5] in
Ecuador, at 1,675.89 km/h (1,041.35 mph)
and 6,383.95 km (3,966.80 mi) from the
axis. Like Chimborazo, which is the fourth
fastest peak at 1,675.47 km/h
(1,041.09 mph), it is close to the Equator and
takes advantage of the oblate spheroid
figure of Earth. More importantly, however, it
being so near the Equator means that the
majority of its distance from Earth's centre
goes into it being away from the axis. The
importance of latitude becomes most
apparent when one looks at the Challenger
Deep (speed of 1,639.15 km/h or
1,018.52 mph) compared to Mount Everest
(speed of 1,481.67 km/h or 920.67 mph).

Highest points attainable by transportation

…
The highest point accessible...
...by land vehicle is an elevation of
6,688 m (21,942 ft) on Ojos del Salado
in Chile, which was reached by the
Chilean duo of Gonzalo and Eduardo
Canales Moya on 21 April 2007 with a
modified Suzuki Samurai, setting the
high-altitude record for a four-wheeled
vehicle.

...by road (dead end) is on a mining

road to the summit of Aucanquilcha in
Chile, which reaches an elevation of
6,176 m (20,262 ft). It was once usable
by 20-tonne mining trucks.[6] The road
is no longer usable. 21.214°S 68.475°W

...by road (mountain pass) is disputed;

there are a number of competing claims
for this title due to the definition of
"motorable pass" (i.e. a surfaced road or
one simply passable by a vehicle):
The highest asphalted road
crosses Tibet's Semo La pass at
5,565 m (18,258 ft). It is used by
trucks and buses regularly.[7] The
Ticlio pass, on the Central Road of
Peru, is the highest surfaced road in
the Americas, at an elevation of
4,818 m (15,807 ft).

The highest unsurfaced road is

claimed by several different roads.
All are unsurfaced or gravel roads
including the barely passable road
to Umling, LA, 17 km (11 mi) west of
Demchok in Ladakh, India, which
reaches 5,800 m (19,029 ft)
("19,300 feet" according to a Border
Roads Organisation sign there that
recognizes it as the "World's
Highest Motorable Pass"),[8] and
Mana Pass, between India and
Tibet, which is crossed by a gravel
road reaching 5,610 m (18,406 ft).
The heavily trafficked Khardung La
in Ladakh lies at 5,359 m (17,582 ft).
A possibly motorable gravel road
crosses Marsimik La in Ladakh at
5,582 m (18,314 ft).

...by train is Tanggula Pass, located on

the Qinghai–Tibet (Qingzang) Railway in
the Tanggula Mountains of
Qinghai/Tibet, China, at 5,072 m
(16,640 ft). The Tanggula railway station
is the world's highest railway station at
5,068 m (16,627 ft). Before the
Qingzang Railway was built, the highest
railway ran between Lima and Huancayo
in Peru, reaching 4,829 m (15,843 ft) at
Ticlio.[9]

...by oceangoing vessel is a segment

of the Rhine–Main–Danube Canal
between the Hilpoltstein and
Bachhausen locks in Bavaria, Germany.
The locks artificially raise the surface
level of the water in the canal to 406 m
(1,332 ft) above mean sea level, higher
than any other lock system in the world,
making it the highest point currently
accessible by oceangoing commercial
watercraft.

La Rinconada, Peru

The highest commercial airport is

Daocheng Yading Airport, Sichuan, China, at
4,411 m (14,472 ft).[10] The proposed Nagqu
Dagring Airport in Tibet, if built, will be 25 m
(82 ft) higher at 4,436 m (14,554 ft).

The highest helipad is Sonam, Siachen

Glacier, India, at a height of 6,400 m
(20,997 ft) above sea level.[11]

The highest permanent human settlement

is La Rinconada, Peru, 5,100 m (16,732 ft), in
the Peruvian Andes.

The farthest road from the Earth's centre

is the Road to Carrel Hut in the Ecuadorian
Andes, at an elevation of 4,850 m (15,912 ft)
above sea level and a distance of 6,382.9 km
(3,966 mi) from the centre of the Earth.[12]

Highest geographical features

…
The highest volcano is Ojos del Salado on
the Argentina–Chile border. It has the
highest summit, 6,893 m (22,615 ft), of any
volcano on Earth.

The highest natural lake is an unnamed

crater lake on Ojos del Salado at 6,390 m
(20,965 ft),[13] on the Argentina side.
Another candidate was Lhagba Pool on the
northeast slopes of Mount Everest, Tibet, at
an elevation of 6,368 m (20,892 ft), which
has since dried up.[14]

The highest navigable lake is Lake Titicaca,

on the border of Bolivia and Peru in the
Andes, at 3,812 m (12,507 ft).

The highest glacier is the Khumbu Glacier

on the southwest slopes of Mount Everest in
Nepal, beginning on the west side of Lhotse
at an elevation of 7,600 to 8,000 m (24,900
to 26,200 ft).[15]

The highest river is disputed; one candidate

from many possibilities is the Ating Ho,
which flows into the Aong Tso (Hagung Tso),
a large lake in Tibet, and has an elevation of
about 6,100 m (20,013 ft) at its source at
32°49′30″N 81°03′45″E. A very large and
high river is the Yarlung Tsangpo or upper
Brahmaputra River in Tibet, whose main
stem, the Maquan River, has its source at
about 6,020 m (19,751 ft) above sea level at
30°48′59″N 82°42′45″E.[16] Above these
elevations, there are no constantly flowing
rivers since the temperature is almost always
below freezing.

The highest island is one of a number of

islands in the Orba Co lake in Tibet, at an
elevation of 5,209 m (17,090 ft).[17]

Lowest points
…
Lowest artificial points
…
The lowest point underground ever
reached was 12,262 m (40,230 ft) deep (SG-
3 at the Kola Superdeep Borehole).

The lowest human-sized point

underground is 3,900 m (12,800 ft)[18]
below ground at the TauTona Mine,
Carletonville, South Africa.

The lowest (from sea level) artificially

made point with open sky may be the
Hambach surface mine, Germany, which
reaches a depth of 293 m (961 ft) below sea
level.

The lowest (from surface) artificially

made point with open sky may be the
Bingham Canyon open-pit mine, Salt Lake
City, United States, at a depth of 1,200 m
(3,900 ft) below surface level.

The lowest point underwater is the

10,685 m (35,056 ft)-deep (as measured
from the subsea wellhead) oil and gas well
drilled on the Tiber Oil Field in the Gulf of
Mexico. The wellhead of this well was an
additional 1,259 m (4,131 ft) underwater for a
total distance of 11,944 m (39,186 ft) as
measured from sea level.[19]28.736667°N
88.386944°W

Lowest natural points

…
See also: List of places on land with elevations below
sea level

The lowest known point is Challenger

Deep, at the bottom of the Mariana Trench,
11,034 m (36,201 ft) below sea level.[20] Only
six humans have reached the bottom of the
trench: Jacques Piccard and U.S. Navy
Lieutenant Don Walsh in 1960 aboard the
bathyscaphe Trieste, filmmaker James
Cameron in 2012 aboard Deepsea
Challenger, as well as Victor Vescovo,
Patrick Lahey, and Jonathan Struwe aboard
the DSV Limiting Factor in 2019.[21]

The lowest point underground is more than

2,000 m (6,600 ft) under the Earth's surface.
For example, the altitude difference between
the entrance and the deepest explored point
(the maximum depth) of the Krubera Cave in
Georgia is 2,191 ± 20 m (7,188 ± 66 ft). In
2012, Ukrainian cave diver Gennadiy
Samokhin reached the lowest point, breaking
the world record.[22]

The lowest point on land not covered by

liquid water is the canyon under Denman
Glacier, with the bedrock being 3,500 m
(11,500 ft) below sea level.[23][24]

The shore of the Dead Sea in Israel

The lowest point on dry land is the shore of

the Dead Sea, shared by Israel, Palestine,
and Jordan, 432.65 m (1,419 ft) below sea
level. As the Dead Sea waters are receding,
the water surface level drops more than 1 m
per year.[25]

The point on the surface closest to the

Earth's centre (interpreted as a natural
surface of the land or sea that is accessible
by a person) is the surface of the Arctic
Ocean at the Geographic North Pole
(6,356.77 km or 3,950 mi).
The closest point on the ground
(interpreted as a land surface or sea
floor) is the bottom of the Litke Deep,
which is 6,351.61 km (3,947 mi) from the
centre of the Earth.[citation needed] By
comparison, the bottom of the deepest
oceanic trench in the world, the Mariana
Trench in the Pacific Ocean, is 14.7 km
(9 mi) farther from the centre of the
Earth.

Lowest points attainable by transportation

…
The lowest point accessible...
...by road, excluding roads in mines, is
any of the roads alongside the Dead Sea
in Israel and Jordan, which are the
lowest on Earth at 418 m (1,371 ft) below
sea level.
The lowest undersea highway
tunnel is the Eiksund Tunnel, in
Norway, at 287 m (942 ft) below
sea level.

...by train, excluding the tracks inside

some South African gold mines, which
can be several thousand metres below
sea level, is located in the Seikan Tunnel
of Japan railroad, at 240 m (787 ft)
below sea level. For comparison, the
undersea Channel Tunnel between
England and France reaches a depth of
75 m (246 ft) below sea level.

The lowest railroad station was the Japanese

Yoshioka-Kaitei Station, at 150 m (492 ft)
below sea level, but it was closed in 2014. The
lowest railroad not inside a tunnel is 120 m
(394 ft) below sea level, at Beit She'an railway
station in Israel.[citation needed]

The lowest airfield is the Bar Yehuda

Airfield, near Masada, Israel, at 378 m
(1,240 ft) below sea level.

The lowest commercial airport is Atyrau

Airport, near Atyrau, Kazakhstan, at 22 m
(72 ft) below sea level, in the basin of the
Caspian Sea.

Lowest cities
…
Baku, Azerbaijan is located 28 m (92 ft) below
sea level, which makes it the lowest-lying
national capital in the world and also the
largest city in the world located below sea
level.

Remoteness
…
Poles of inaccessibility
…
Main article: Pole of inaccessibility

Each continent has its own continental pole of

inaccessibility, defined as the place on the
continent that is farthest from any ocean.
Similarly, each ocean has its own oceanic pole
of inaccessibility, defined as the place in the
ocean that is farthest from any land.

Continental
…
The most distant point from an ocean is
the Eurasian Pole of Inaccessibility (or
"EPIA") 46°17′N 86°40′E, in China's Xinjiang
region near the border with Kazakhstan.
Calculations have shown that this point,
located in the Dzoosotoyn Elisen Desert, is
2,645 km (1,644 mi) from the nearest
coastline. The nearest settlement to the EPIA
is Suluk at 46°15′N 86°50′E, about 11 km
(6.8 mi) to the east.[citation needed] A 2007
study suggests that the historical calculation
of the EPIA failed to recognize the point
where the Gulf of Ob joins the Arctic Ocean,
and proposes instead that varying definitions
of coastline could result in other locations for
the EPIA:
EPIA1, somewhere between 44°17′N
82°11′E and 44°29′N 82°19′E, is about
2,510 ± 10 km (1,559.6 ± 6.2 mi) from
the nearest ocean.

EPIA2, somewhere between 45°17′N

88°08′E and 45°28′N 88°14′E, is about
2,514 ± 7 km (1,562.1 ± 4.3 mi) from the
nearest ocean.[26]
If adopted, this would place the final EPIA
roughly 130 km (81 mi) closer to the ocean
than the point that is currently agreed
upon.[26] Coincidentally, EPIA1, or EPIA2, and
the most remote of the Oceanic Pole of
Inaccessibility (specifically, the point in the
South Pacific Ocean that is farthest from
land) are similarly remote; EPIA1 is less than
200 km (120 mi) closer to the ocean than the
Oceanic Pole of Inaccessibility is to land.
The continental poles of inaccessibility for
the other continents are as follows:
Africa: 5.65°N 26.17°E,[26] close to the
tripoint of the Central African Republic,
South Sudan, and the Democratic
Republic of the Congo

Australia: either 23°2′S 132°10′E,[27] or

23.17°S 132.27°E,[26] near Papunya,
Northern Territory

North America: 43.36°N 101.97°W,[26]

between Kyle, South Dakota and Allen,
South Dakota, United States.

South America: 14.05°S 56.85°W,[26]

near Arenápolis, Mato Grosso, Brazil

Oceanic
…
The most distant point from land is the
Pacific pole of inaccessibility (also called
"Point Nemo"), which lies in the South Pacific
Ocean at 48°52.6′S 123°23.6′W,
approximately 2,688 km (1,670 mi) from the
nearest land (equidistant from Ducie Island
in the Pitcairn Islands to the north, Motu Nui
off Rapa Nui to the northeast, and Maher
Island off Siple Island near Marie Byrd Land,
Antarctica, to the south).[28]
Other places considered the most
remote …

Bouvet Island

The most remote island is Bouvet Island, a

small, uninhabited island in the South
Atlantic Ocean that is a dependency of
Norway. It lies at coordinates 54°26′S
3°24′E. The nearest land is the uninhabited
Queen Maud Land, Antarctica, over 1,600 km
(994 mi) to the south. The nearest inhabited
lands are Gough Island, 1,845 km (1,146 mi)
away, Tristan da Cunha, 2,260 km (1,404 mi)
away, and the coast of South Africa,
2,580 km (1,603 mi) away.

The title for most remote inhabited island

or archipelago (the farthest away from any
other permanently inhabited place) depends
on how the question is interpreted. If the
south Atlantic island Tristan da Cunha
(population about 300) and its dependency
Gough Island (with a small staffed research
post), which are 399 km (248 mi) from each
other, are considered part of the same
archipelago, or if Gough Island is not
counted because it has no permanent
residents, then Tristan da Cunha is the
world's most remote inhabited
island/archipelago: the main island, also
called Tristan da Cunha, is 2,434 km
(1,512 mi) from the island Saint Helena,
2,816 km (1,750 mi) from South Africa, and
3,360 km (2,090 mi) from South America. It
is 2,260 km (1,404 mi) away from
uninhabited Bouvet Island. However, if
Gough and Tristan da Cunha are considered
separately, they disqualify each other, and
the most remote inhabited island is Easter
Island in the South Pacific Ocean, which lies
2,075 km (1,289 mi) from Pitcairn Island
(about 50 residents in 2013), 2,606 km
(1,619 mi) from Rikitea on the island of
Mangareva (the nearest town with a
population over 500), and 3,512 km
(2,182 mi) from the coast of Chile (the
nearest continental point and the country of
which Easter Island is part). The Kerguelen
Islands in the southern Indian Ocean are
another contender, lying 1,340 km (830 mi)
from the small Alfred Faure scientific station
in Île de la Possession, but otherwise more
than 3,300 km (2,100 mi) from the coast of
Madagascar (the nearest permanently
inhabited place), 450 km (280 mi) northwest
of the uninhabited Heard Island and
McDonald Islands (both a part of Australia),
and 1,440 km (890 mi) from the non-
permanent scientific station located in Île
Amsterdam.

The most remote city...

...with a population in excess of one
million from the nearest city with a
population in excess of one million is
Auckland, New Zealand. The nearest
city of comparable size or greater is
Sydney, Australia, 2,168.9 km
(1,347.7 mi) away.[29]

...with a population in excess of one

million from the nearest city with a
population above 100,000 is Perth,
Australia, located 2,138 km
(1,328 mi)[30] away from Adelaide,
Australia.

...with a population in excess of

100,000 from the nearest city of at
least that population is Honolulu,