The Quest to find the Highest Peak on Australian Territory





The Quest to find the Highest Peak on Australian Territory!

I have searched high and low on the internet and in the School Library (Resource Centre) seeking the answer to this question. I asked the question what was the highest peak on Australian Territory in Antarctica. Two replies said Mawson Peak on Heard Island standing at 2745m was the highest peak. However there are a few higher than that so we can dismiss these answers. Both Librarians said Mt Menzies. The atlas says Mt McClintock standing at 3492m is the tallest. Some people think Mt Kirkpatrick is the highest but The Encyclop�dia Britannica says: Queen Alexandra Range mountain range of Antarctica, located in Ross Dependency (New Zealand) along the western edge of the Ross Ice Shelf. The range reaches an elevation of 14,856 feet (4,528 m) in Mount Kirkpatrick. The quest continues....

Here are some webpages with different answers on them

Orie Cornell Edu scroll down to 9.1 Geographic Information, External Territories

Here are the answers I have received so far:

Emails I have received:

Answer 1.
From my research, the answer to your question is Mount Menzies. I must say that I didn't find this actually stated any where but from what I have found it seems to be the highest peak in Australia's Antarctic territory.

I found this information by going to Yahoo And searching in their categories. I clicked on the links Regional > Regions >. (These are all within the Categories section of Yahoo.)

This pulled up a link for the Australian Antarctic Data Centre. I followed this link to here. I went to the search link on this page and in the Search Area drop bar picked Gazetteer (A gazetteer is a list of geographical names.) I then searched. This puts you into an advanced search with allows you to search for different Feature Types (I used Mountain) and chose what information is displayed ( I displayed English Name, Latitude, Longitude, and Narrative). I then searched. This brought up all the mountains listed in the Gazetteer.

I skimmed through the list and found that Hunt Mountain is 3660 m tall and Mount Menzies is 3315 m tall.

I then went to www.lib.utexas.edu. (which I found by following the Regional > Regions > Antarctica > Science >Geography) This gave me a link for a map webpage called Maps of Polar Regions and Oceans. This is a page that lets you look at various maps of Antarctica. I chose the link for Antarctica - Research Stations and Territorial Claims. Using this map I determined that Hunt Mountain is in New Zealand's territory and that Mount Menzies is in Australian territory.

Answer 2.

Dear Karen, Thank you for using Ask a Librarian for answering the following enquiry: > Date: Wed, 14 Feb 2001 09:51:37 GMT
> Subject: Ask A Librarian
> From: [email protected]
> Reply-to: [email protected]
> [This message was sent through the www-email gateway.]
We found the answer on the Internet it's - Mount Menzies 3355metres.
The following organisation should be able to also confirm this:
Australian Antartic Division
Channel Highway,
Kingston,
Tasmania 7050 Tel: 61 3 6232 3209
Christine Hodgson
Senior Librarian
Central Reference Library,
Bishop Street, Leicester LE1 6AA
0116 2556699 ex. 3459

Answer 3

Hi, Here is some information I found.

It is a little known fact that the highest point on Australian territory, at a height of 2745 metres, is Mawson Peak, on a mountain called Big Ben. This is an active volcano on Heard Island, well south of the Australian continent in the Southern Ocean, approaching the coast of Antarctica.

This came from the following site.
Aust. Gov. High Mountains

I hope this helps.
Theresa

Answer 4:

If you want to know the highest peak on Antarctica that's located in Australian territory (as opposed to knowing peaks in the separate localities):

It's not very well known that the highest point on Australian territory, at a height of 2745 metres, is Mawson Peak, on a mountain called Big Ben. This is an active volcano on Heard Island, well south of the Australian continent in the Southern Ocean, approaching the coast of Antarctica.