Mount Elbrus
Mount Elbrus is the highest mountain in Russia and Europe. It is a dormant stratovolcano rising above sea level, and is the highest volcano in Eurasia, as well as the tenth-most prominent peak in the world. It is situated in the southern Russian republic of Kabardino-Balkaria in the western extension of Ciscaucasia, and is the highest peak of the Caucasus Mountains.
Elbrus has two summits, both of which are dormant volcanic domes. The taller, western summit is ; the eastern summit is. The earliest recorded ascent of the eastern summit was on 10 July 1829 by a Circassian man named Khillar Khashirov, and the western summit in 1874 by a British expedition led by F. Crauford Grove and including Frederick Gardiner, Horace Walker and the Swiss guide
Etymology
The name Elbrus seems to have a connection with Alborz, which is also the name of a long mountain range in northern Iran. The name is derived from Avestan Harā Bərəzaitī, a legendary mountain in Iranian mythology. Harā Bərəzaitī reflects Proto-Iranian *Harā Bṛzatī, which was reformed into Middle Persian as Harborz, and into Modern Persian as Alborz. Bṛzatī is the feminine form of the adjective *bṛzant, the reconstructed ancestor of Modern Ossetian bærzond, Modern Persian bārez, berāzande, and boland, and Modern Kurdish barez. Harā may be interpreted as "watch" or "guard", from Indo-European *ser. Circassians use the name "Uash-ha Makhua" which means "The mountain of happiness", The name "Mingi Taw" used by Karachays and Balkars means "Eternal Mountain" in Turkic languages.Geography
Situation
Elbrus is situated in the northwest of the Caucasus, 100 kilometres from the Black Sea and 370 kilometres from the Caspian Sea, which is visible from Elbrus on exceptionally clear days. It rises 5,642 metres above the sea level. Located eleven kilometres north of the Greater Caucasus Watershed, marking the border with Georgia, it is on the border of the Russian republics of Kabardino-Balkaria and Karachay-Cherkessia. It is the highest peak in both Russia and Europe.Elbrus is located 65 kilometres southwest of the city of Kislovodsk and 80 kilometers west-southwest of Nalchik. By road it is accessible from European route E50, known to Russians as either the M29 highway or the R217 highway. Prielbrusye National Park, which is accessed by the A158 road out of Baksan, lies on its southeastern flank. Access permits are required south of Baksan because of border controls.
Topography
Elbrus is an almost symmetrical dormant volcano, in a vertical plane, with two main peaks, on either side of a pass located at 5,416 metres above sea level: the western summit is the highest point at 5,642 metres above sea level. while the eastern summit rises to 5,621 meters. The crater, 300 to 400 metres in diameter, located at the top of the eastern peak, was gradually filled with snow and ice. The snowfields of the volcano, covering an area of, feed 22 main glaciers and 77 secondary glaciers that give rise to the Baksan rivers: Kuban and Malka. Some of these glaciers can reach 400 metres in thickness but all are receding, having lost between 80 and 500 meters in length. The two main ones are called Bolshoi Azaou, with an area of and a length of 9.28 km, and Irik, with an area of and a length of 9.31 km. This glacial activity has formed numerous small but deep lakes.Geology
The Caucasus is formed by the northward collision of the Arabian Plate against the Eurasian Plate that causes numerous earthquakes in the region. The fault zone is complex and the large lateral displacement at the level of Anatolia and Iran prevents the creation of a subduction phenomenon and explains the rarity of volcanoes in the mountain range.Elbrus started to form 10 million years ago. The ejecta from the volcano covers an area of 260 km2. Fragments of rhyolite and rhyodacite as well as tuff and ignimbrite formations analyzed by uranium-lead dating place the formation of the main caldera around 700,000 years ago, probably corresponding to the end of a major eruptive cycle. Geochronological dating has revealed subsequent synchronous eruptive cycles in different focimagmatic deposits of the Greater Caucasus, demonstrating the common geological origin of this volcanic activity. Fumaroles still sometimes escape from the eastern flank of Elbrus, at the level of the ancient lava flow of 24 kilometers long oriented from the crater to the north-northeast, and hot springs originate on the slopes of the mountain.
Eruptive history
Mount Elbrus was formed more than 2.5 million years ago. The volcano is currently considered dormant. Elbrus was active in the Holocene, and according to the Global Volcanism Program, the last eruption took place about AD 50. Evidence of recent volcanism includes several lava flows on the mountain, which look fresh, and roughly of volcanic debris. The longest flow extends down the northeast summit, indicative of a large eruption. There are other signs of activity on the volcano, including solfataric activity and hot springs. The western summit has a well-preserved volcanic crater about in diameter.Climate
As Elbrus is located in the Northern Hemisphere, the summer period takes place from June to mid-September, with an average of 50% of sunny days favorable to the ascent of the summit. However, the winds, dominated by westerly air masses, can turn violent and temperatures drop very quickly. Above 4000 meters above sea level, even in summer, blizzard conditions with near zero visibility can develop. It is not uncommon for the wind to exceed 100 km/h. In winter, the temperature can drop below −50° at the top. Precipitation increases with altitude.Mount Elbrus as a whole is warm/hot-summer humid continental with hot, moderately wet summers and cold, somewhat dry winters. It is on the border between a Dfa and Dfb climate, at average temperature 72 F in July and August. The summit has an ice-cap climate. Snow is fairly common, at 45 days a year on average, and winter and late fall are driest. Winters are somewhat moderate for the latitude.
History
Greek mythology
In the Periplus of the Euxine Sea, written in Greek in ca. 130, Arrian mentioned a summit in the Caucasus named Strobilos: "… as we turned from Astelphos toward Dioscurias, we saw the Caucasus range One peak of the Caucasus was pointed out—the name of the peak was Strobilos—where according to the story Prometheus was hanged by Hephaistos on Zeus' order". Arrian's Strobilos, or Latinized Strobilus, was later identified as Elbrus by some writers such as Douglas Freshfield in The Exploration of the Caucasus. Freshfield called Elbrus "pinecone-shaped" for the sake of etymology. The ancient Greek word strobilos denotes rotating or twisted objects such as a spinning top or a pinecone.First Ascents (1829–1930s)
The lower of the two summits was first ascended on by Khillar Khachirov, a guide for an Imperial Russian army scientific expedition led by General Georgi Emmanuel, and the higher in 1874 by an English expedition led by F. Crauford Grove and including Frederick Gardiner, Horace Walker, and the Swiss guide from the Valais canton and guide Ahiya Sottaiev. During the early years of the Soviet Union, mountaineering became a popular sport of the populace, and there was tremendous traffic on the mountain. On 17 March 1936, a group of 33 inexperienced Komsomol members attempted the mountain and ended up suffering four fatalities when they slipped on the ice and fell to their deaths.Second World War
During the Battle of the Caucasus in World War II, the Wehrmacht occupied the area, surrounding the mountain from August 1942 to February 1943 with Gebirgsjäger from the 1st Mountain Division. A detachment was sent by Hubert Lanz, the general officer commanding the German division, to climb to the summit of Elbrus and plant the swastika flag, which was accomplished on 21 August 1942. When the news was reported to Adolf Hitler, he reportedly flew into a rage, called the achievement a "stunt" and threatened to court martial the general. The flags were removed by USSR army mountaineers on 13 and 17 February 1943, but Abwehr and Caucasian Germans remained active in that area until November 1943.A possibly apocryphal story tells of a Soviet pilot being given a medal for bombing the main mountaineering hut, Priyut 11, while it was occupied. He was later nominated for a medal for not hitting the hut, but instead, the German fuel supply, leaving the hut standing for future generations.
Mt. Elbrus was briefly incorporated into the Georgian SSR from 1944 - 1956.
Post-WWII
The Soviet Union encouraged ascents of Elbrus, and in 1956 it was climbed en masse by 400 mountaineers to mark the 400th anniversary of the incorporation of Kabardino-Balkaria, the Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic where Elbrus was located.Between 1959 and 1976, a cable car system was built in stages that can take visitors as high as.
National park
Since 1986, Elbrus has been incorporated into Prielbrusye National Park, one of the protected areas of Russia.Special ascents
By vehicle
In 1997 a team led by the Russian mountaineer Alexander Abramov took a Land Rover Defender to the summit of the East Peak, entering the Guinness Book of Records. The project took 45 days in total. They were able to drive the vehicle as high as the mountain huts at The Barrels, but above this they used a pulley system to raise it most of the way. On the way down, a driver lost control of the vehicle and had to jump out. Although he survived the accident, the vehicle crashed onto the rocks and remains below the summit to this day.In 2016, the Russian climbers Artyom Kuimov and Sergey Baranov entered the Guinness Book of World Records by reaching the summit of Elbrus on ATVs.