
Puncak Jaya
Mountain · 4,884 m
Puncak Jaya is a mountain rising to 4,884 metres (16,024 ft) in Indonesia, in the Oceania region.
Puncak Jaya (Indonesian: [ˈpuntʃak ˈdʒaja]; literally 'Victorious Peak', Damal: Nemangkawi Ninggok) or Carstensz Pyramid (, Indonesian: Piramida Carstensz, Dutch: Carstenszpiramide) on the island of New Guinea, with an elevation of 4,884 m (16,024 ft), is the highest mountain peak of an island on Earth, and the highest peak in Indonesia and within Oceania. The mountain is located in the Sudirman Range of the highlands of Mimika Regency, Central Papua, Indonesia. Puncak Jaya is ranked 5th in the world by topographic isolation.
When regarding New Guinea as part of the Australian continent in a biogeographical sense, Puncak Jaya can be considered the highest peak in all of Oceania, with its elevation exceeding those of the highest peaks in the nearby nations of Papua New Guinea (Mount Wilhelm), New Zealand (Aoraki / Mount Cook) and Australia (Mount Kosciuszko). Puncak Jaya is therefore often listed as one of the Seven Summits.
Adapted from Wikipedia: Puncak Jaya (CC BY-SA 4.0).
- Elevation
- 4,884 m (16,024 ft)
- Global rank
- #66 of 641 indexed
- Region
- Oceania (#1)
- Subregion
- Melanesia
- Country
- Indonesia
- Coordinates
- -4.0777°, 137.1662°
Of the 641 named summits indexed in YearMaps, Puncak Jaya ranks #66 by elevation, below Vinson Massif (4,892 m) and above Sabalon Kuh (4,814 m).
- Ranges:
- Maoke Mountains (Oceania), New Guinea Highlands (Oceania)
- Neighbouring summits:
- Gunung Binaiya (3,027 m), Mount Wilhelm (4,509 m), Ulawun (2,334 m)
More about Puncak Jaya
Geology
caused by an oblique collision between the Australian and Pacific plates, and is made of middle Miocene limestones.
While Puncak Jaya's peak is free of ice, there are several glaciers on its slopes, including the Carstensz Glacier, West Northwall Firn, East Northwall Firn and the recently vanished Meren Glacier in the Meren Valley (meren is Dutch for "lakes").
Being equatorial, there is little variation in the mean temperature during the year (around 0.5 °C [32.9 °F]) and the glaciers fluctuate on a seasonal basis only slightly.
History
The highlands surrounding the peak were inhabited before European contact, and the peak is known as Nemangkawi in Amungkal.
Puncak Jaya was named "Carstensz Pyramid" after Dutch explorer Jan Carstenszoon, who was the first European to sight the glaciers on the peak of the mountain on a rare clear day in 1623. The sighting went unverified for over two centuries, and Carstensz was ridiculed in Europe when he said he had seen snow near the equator. It appeared on maps of the time as Sneebergh.
The snowfield of Puncak Trikora, 170 km (106 mi) east of here, was reached as early as 1909 by a Dutch explorer, Hendrik Albert Lorentz, with six of his Dayak Kenyah porters recruited from the Apo Kayan in Borneo.
Sections adapted from Wikipedia: Puncak Jaya (CC BY-SA 4.0).
Puncak Jaya: Key Facts
| Topographic prominence | 4,884 m |
|---|---|
| Mountain range | Sudirmanbergen |
Facts from Wikidata Q1045888 (CC0).





