Portal:Geography

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The Geography Portal

Geography studies the location, extent, distribution, frequency and interaction of all significant elements of the human and physical environment on the Earth's surface, particularly its features and of the distribution of life on the earth, including human life and the effects of human activity. The word geography derives from the Greek γη (ge) or γαια (gaia) ("Earth") and γραφειν (graphein) ("to inscribe"). Physical geography focuses on Earth science (and is sometimes called Earth System Science). This provides an understanding of the physical, meteorological and ecological patterns of the Earth. Human geography includes economic, political and cultural geography and focuses on the social science or the non-physical aspects of the world. It examines how human beings adapt themselves to the land and how they impact the physical world. Geographers not only study the human and natural features of the Earth but also its place in the Solar System and the Universe and how this affects the Earth features (e.g. climate, sea currents and tides). More about Geography... edit

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Selected article

Mount Pinatubo is an active stratovolcano located on the island of Luzon in the Philippines, at the intersection of the borders of the provinces of Zambales, Tarlac, and Pampanga. Ancestral Pinatubo was a stratovolcano made of andesite and dacite. Before 1991, the mountain was inconspicuous and heavily eroded. It was covered in dense forest which supported a population of several thousand indigenous people, the Aeta, who had fled to the mountains from the lowlands when the Spanish conquered the Philippines in 1565.

The volcano's eruption in June 1991 produced the second largest terrestrial eruption of the 20th century. The 1991 eruption had a Volcanic Explosivity Index (VEI) of 6, and came some 450-500 years after the volcano's last known eruptive activity (estimated as VEI 5, the level of the 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens), and some 500-1000 years after previous VEI 6 eruptive activity. Successful predictions of the onset of the climactic eruption led to the evacuation of tens of thousands of people from the surrounding areas, saving many lives, but surrounding areas were severely damaged by pyroclastic flows, ash deposits, and later by lahars caused by rainwater remobilizing earlier volcanic deposits: thousands of houses and other buildings were destroyed.

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Selected picture

Howard's Pass in Nahanni National Park Reserve in Yukon, Canada.

Image credit: Jo Ohara

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Did you know...

...that sandstone layers (pictured) now exposed in the Canyons of the Escalante in Utah were deposited during the Mesozoic period, when the area was covered with sand dunes about 180 to 225 million years ago?
...that the Firth of Clyde is Great Britain's first seabird reserve?
...that Amsterdam has a concentric belt of canals around it?
...that the Korotoa River, a small stream in Rajshahi Division of Bangladesh, was once a large and sacred river?
...that Belgium's sillon industriel (steelmaking) was the first fully industrialized area in continental Europe?

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Articles

Antarctica Afro-Eurasia Americas Australia Africa Eurasia North America Oceania Europe Asia South America Supercontinents:
Gondwana • Laurasia • Pangaea • Rodinia

Polar areas: Arctic | Antarctic edit

WikiProjects

WikiProject Geography

Cities • Country subdivisions • Urban studies and planning • Former Countries • Subdivisions of former countries • Mountains · Rivers • Protected areas • Glaciers • Lakes • Tropical cyclones • Geographical coordinates • Maps • Waterfalls

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New articles

Please feel free to list your new Geography-related articles here (newer articles at the top, please). Any new articles that have an interesting or unusual fact in them should be suggested for the Did you know? box on the Main Wikipedia page. DYN has a 72 hr. time limit from the creation of the article.