Nature · Cordillera Blanca · bounded summit-area surface
Alpamayo: terrain elevation and local relief
Alpamayo uses an approximately 5,709-meter surface estimate in EGM2008 from Copernicus GLO-30. The bounded terrain section has about 850 meters of local relief above its lowest sampled point. Published summit surveys are separate references.
≈ 5,709 m
Data-derived estimate- Measurement
- Highest sampled surface in the documented Copernicus terrain section · EGM2008
- Subject or version
- Cordillera Blanca · bounded summit-area surface
- In feet, rounded
- 18,731.2 ft (1 ft = 0.3048 m)
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Terrain boundary, base and datum
- Vertical reference
- EGM2008. Published surveys are separate; no datum conversion is applied.
- Highest sampled surface
- 5709.3 m at -8.878333°, -77.654444°.
- Local base
- 4859.0 m at -8.871111°, -77.645278°. Lowest sampled point within this bounded terrain section.
- Section bounds in WGS84-G1150
- West -77.661528°, east -77.645139°; south -8.887361°, north -8.870972°.
- View and scale
- Orthographic map section facing north. Equal horizontal and vertical map scales. Approximate grid spacing: 30.6 m east-west and 30.7 m north-south. Lower and surrounding terrain omitted.
produced using Copernicus WorldDEM-30 © DLR e.V. 2010-2014 and © Airbus Defence and Space GmbH 2014-2018 provided under COPERNICUS by the European Union and ESA; all rights reserved
A little more perspective
Gerald Holdsworth’s 1969 American Alpine Journal report gives Alpamayo as 5,947 meters from theodolite surveying. This Copernicus section reaches approximately 5,709 meters in EGM2008 near the selected summit coordinate, roughly 238 meters below that dated reference. The discrepancy is substantial: the source grid strongly smooths this sharp mountain, and the image cannot reproduce its fine ridges. The boundary excludes the higher neighboring Quitaraju.
The local-relief view subtracts the lowest sampled point in this section: 4859.0 meters at -8.871111° latitude, -77.645278° longitude. This produces about 850 meters of relief within the stated boundary. It is not a universal mountain base, a route’s total ascent, or topographic prominence.
The rendered surface uses the public 2021 Copernicus release, primarily based on TanDEM-X observations from 2011–2015 with infill from other sources. It is a surface model rather than a current bare-earth survey. Neutral shading explains the geometry without claiming a snow season or photographic ground texture. No datum conversion or summit correction is applied.
Quick facts
Alpamayo uses an approximately 5,709-meter surface estimate in EGM2008 from Copernicus GLO-30. The bounded terrain section has about 850 meters of local relief above its lowest sampled point. Published summit surveys are separate references.
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Sources and measurement notes
- Gerald Holdsworth, American Alpine Journal 1969: Alpamayo measurement
- Copernicus DEM: dataset definition, datums and attribution
- Public Copernicus GLO-30 release documentation
- Wikidata: summit-area identity and initial coordinate
- Copernicus source terrain tile 1 (GeoTIFF)
Alpamayo’s 5,947-meter historical survey is separate from a substantially softened, approximately 5,709-meter surface estimate.
Source review recorded . Maintained by Ishan Karunaratne. Suggest a correction with a source and the exact measurement being compared.