Mount Kilimanjaro (/ˌkɪlɪmənˈdʒɑːroʊ/)[4] is a dormant volcano located in Kilimanjaro Region of Tanzania. It has three volcanic cones: Kibo, Mawenzi, and Shira. It is the highest mountain in Africa and the highest single free-standing mountain above sea level in the world: 5,895 m (19,341 ft) above sea level and about 4,900 m (16,100 ft) above its plateau base. It is the highest volcano in Africa and the Eastern Hemisphere.
Kilimanjaro is the fourth most topographically prominent peak on Earth. It is part of Kilimanjaro National Park and is a major hiking and climbing destination. Because of its shrinking glaciers and ice fields, which are projected to disappear between 2025 and 2035, it has been the subject of many scientific studies.
Picture I took while flying a Cessna 402 departing out of Amboseli, when I flew for Mombasa Air Services, 1979
An aerial view of Kilimanjaro, taken while departing Amboseli Airport, showing a larger ice and snow cap in 1979.
Toponymy
The historical map with “Kilima-Ndscharo” during the German East Africa in the year 1888.
The origin of the name Kilimanjaro is not known, but a number of theories exist. European explorers had adopted the name by 1860 and reported that Kilimanjaro was the mountain’s Kiswahili name.[5] The 1907 edition of The Nuttall Encyclopædia also records the name of the mountain as Kilima-Njaro.[6]
Johann Ludwig Krapf wrote in 1860 that Swahilis along the coast called the mountain Kilimanjaro. Although he did not offer any support,[7] he claimed that Kilimanjaro meant either mountain of greatness or mountain of caravans. Under the latter meaning, kilima meant mountain and jaro meant caravans.[5] Jim Thompson claimed in 1885, again without support,[7] that the term Kilima-Njaro “has generally been understood to mean” the mountain (kilima) of greatness (njaro). He also suggested “though not improbably it may mean” the white mountain.[8]
Njaro is an ancient Kiswahili word for shining.[9] Similarly, Krapf wrote that a chief of the Wakamba people, whom he visited in 1849, “had been to Jagga and had seen the Kima jajeu, mountain of whiteness, the name given by the Wakamba to Kilimanjaro …”[10] More correctly in the Kikamba language this would be kiima kyeu, and this possible derivation has been popular with several investigators.[7]
Others have assumed that kilima is Kiswahili for mountain. The problem with this assumption is that kilima actually means hill and is, therefore, the diminutive of mlima, the proper Kiswahili word for mountain. However, “[i]t is … possible … that an early European visitor, whose knowledge of [Kiswahili] was not extensive, changed mlima to kilima by analogy with the two Wachagga names: Kibo and Kimawenzi.”[7] A different approach is to assume that the kileman part of Kilimanjaro comes from the Kichagga kileme, which means that which defeats, or kilelema, which means that which has become difficult or impossible. The jaro part would “then be derived from njaare, a bird; or, according to other informants, a leopard; or, possibly from jyaro, a caravan”. Considering that the name Kilimanjaro has never been current among the Wachagga people, it is possible that the name was derived from Wachagga saying that the mountain was unclimbable, kilemanjaare or kilemajyaro, and porters misinterpreting this as being the name of the mountain.[7]
In the 1880s, the mountain became a part of German East Africa and was called Kilima-Ndscharo in German following the Kiswahili name components.[11] On 6 October 1889, Hans Meyer reached the highest summit on the crater ridge of Kibo. He named it Kaiser-Wilhelm-Spitze (Kaiser Wilhelm peak).[12] That name was used until Tanzania was formed in 1964,[13] when the summit was renamed Uhuru Peak, meaning freedom peak in Kiswahili.[14]
Geology and geography
Kilimanjaro is a large dormant stratovolcano composed of three distinct volcanic cones: Kibo, the highest; Mawenzi at 5,149 m (16,893 ft);[15] and Shira, the lowest at 4,005 m (13,140 ft).[16] Mawenzi and Shira are extinct, while Kibo is dormant and could erupt again.[17]
Uhuru Peak is the highest summit on Kibo’s crater rim. The Tanzania National Parks Authority, a Tanzanian government agency,[1] and the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization[18] lists the height of Uhuru Peak as 5,895 m (19,341 ft), based on a British survey in 1952.[19] The height has since been measured as 5,892 m (19,331 ft) in 1999, 5,902 m (19,364 ft) in 2008, and 5,899 m (19,354 ft) in 2014.[19]
A map of the Kibo cone on Mount Kilimanjaro was published by the British government’s Directorate of Overseas Surveys (DOS) in 1964 based on aerial photography conducted in 1962 as the “Subset of Kilimanjaro, East Africa (Tanganyika) Series Y742, Sheet 56/2, D.O.S. 422 1964, Edition 1, Scale 1:50,000”.[20] Tourist mapping was first published by the Ordnance Survey in England in 1989 based on the original DOS mapping at a scale of 1:100,000, with 100 ft (30 m) contour intervals, as DOS 522.[21] West Col Productions produced a map with tourist information in 1990, at a scale of 1:75,000, with 100 m (330 ft) contour intervals; it included inset maps of Kibo and Mawenzi on 1:20,000 and 1:30,000 scales respectively and with 50 m (160 ft) contour intervals.[21] In recent years, numerous other maps have become available, of various qualities.[2]
Volcanology
The volcanic interior of Kilimanjaro is poorly known because there has not been any significant erosion to expose the igneous strata that comprise the volcano’s structure.[22]
Eruptive activity at the Shira centre commenced about 2.5 million years ago, with the last important phase occurring about 1.9 million years ago, just before the northern part of the edifice collapsed.[17] Shira is topped by a broad plateau at 3,800 m (12,500 ft), which may be a filled caldera. The remnant caldera rim has been degraded deeply by erosion. Before the caldera formed and erosion began, Shira might have been between 4,900 and 5,200 m (16,100 and 17,100 ft) high. It is mostly composed of basic lavas, with some pyroclastics. The formation of the caldera was accompanied by lava emanating from ring fractures, but there was no large scale explosive activity. Two cones formed subsequently, the phonolitic one at the northwest end of the ridge and the doleritic Platzkegel in the caldera centre.[17][22][23]
Both Mawenzi and Kibo began erupting about 1 million years ago.[17] They are separated by the Saddle Plateau at 4,400 m (14,400 ft) elevation.[24]: 3
The youngest dated rocks at Mawenzi are about 448,000 years old.[17] Mawenzi forms a horseshoe-shaped ridge with pinnacles and ridges opening to the northeast, with a tower-like shape resulting from deep erosion and a mafic dike swarm. Several large cirques cut into the ring. The largest of these sits on top of the Great Barranco gorge. Also notable are the East and West Barrancos on the northeastern side of the mountain. Most of the eastern side of the mountain has been removed by erosion. Mawenzi has a subsidiary peak, Neumann Tower, 4,425 m (14,518 ft).[17][22][23]
