9781422286371

14

Argentina

Quick Facts: The Geography of Argentina

Location: southern South America, border- ing the Atlantic Ocean, between Chile and Uruguay. Area: slightly less than three-tenths the size of the United States. total: 1,068,296 square miles (2,766,890 sq km) land: 1,056,636 square miles (2,736,690 sq km) water: 11,660 square miles (30,200 sq km) Borders: Bolivia, 517 miles (832 km); Brazil, 760 miles (1,224 km); Chile, 3,200 miles (5,150 km); Paraguay, 1,168 miles (1,880 km); Uruguay, 360 miles (579 km). Climate: mostly temperate; arid in south- east; subantarctic in southwest.

Terrain: rich plains of the Pampas in north- ern half, flat to rolling plateau of Patagonia in south, rugged Andes Mountains along western border. Elevation extremes: lowest point: Salinas Chicas (located on Valdés Peninsula)—131 feet (40 meters) below sea level. highest point: Cerro Aconcagua—22,834 feet (6,960 meters). Natural hazards: San Miguel de Tucumán and Mendoza areas in the Andes sub- ject to earthquakes; pamperos are violent windstorms that can strike the Pampas and northeast; heavy flooding. Source: CIA World Factbook 2015.

world outside central Asia. Several parallel ranges and spurs of the Andes project deeply into northwestern Argentina. The chief rivers of Argentina are the Paraná, which runs through the north-central portion of the country; the Paraguay, the main tributary of the Paraná; and the Río de la Plata, the great estuary at the confluence of the Paraná and Uruguay Rivers. The Uruguay forms part of the boundary with Uruguay. The Paraná-Uruguay system is navigable by ship and boat for about 2,000 miles (3,219 km). A famed scenic attraction, Iguazú Falls, is locat-

Made with FlippingBook HTML5