World Geography Questions and Answers

Answer: A

Correct answer: The Black Sea

The Danube rises in Germany’s Black Forest and flows some 2,850 km eastward to a large delta on the Black Sea, on the Romanian and Ukrainian coast. It passes through or borders ten countries - more than any other river - among them Austria, Slovakia, Hungary, Croatia, Serbia, Bulgaria and Romania, and four national capitals stand on it: Vienna, Bratislava, Budapest and Belgrade. It is the second longest river in Europe after the Volga, which flows the other way into the Caspian, and since the opening of the Rhine–Main–Danube Canal in 1992 it has formed part of a continuous waterway from the North Sea to the Black Sea. Its delta is one of the largest and best-preserved wetlands in Europe and a UNESCO World Heritage site.

Answer: C

The Mesozoic era, spanning roughly 252 to 66 million years ago, is divided into three periods, in order: the Triassic, the Jurassic and the Cretaceous. Options that name only two of them are incomplete, so the combined choice is correct.

The era opens after the Permian mass extinction and closes with the extinction that ended the dinosaurs, which is why it is popularly called the Age of Reptiles.

Answer: C

The Strait of Malacca, between the Malay Peninsula and Sumatra, is about 800 km long - the longest strait in the world. It carries roughly a quarter of the world's traded goods.

Answer: D

The lowest point in Europe is the surface of the Caspian Sea, about 28 m below sea level.

Despite its name the Caspian is a lake - the largest enclosed body of water in the world - with no outlet to any ocean.

Answer: C

Correct answer: The Krishna

The Krishna rises at Mahabaleshwar in the Western Ghats of Maharashtra and flows about 1,400 km east across the Deccan through Karnataka, Telangana and Andhra Pradesh to the Bay of Bengal, where it forms a large delta beside the Godavari’s. It is the second longest of the peninsular rivers. Its eastward course is the rule rather than the exception. The Deccan plateau tilts gently east, so the Godavari, Krishna, Kaveri and Mahanadi all rise close to the western coast and cross almost the whole peninsula to reach the eastern one, building deltas as they go. The Narmada and Tapi are the exceptions, flowing west through rift valleys into the Arabian Sea. The Sabarmati also flows west, through Gujarat. The Krishna is heavily dammed - Nagarjuna Sagar and Srisailam among the largest - and its waters have been the subject of long-running disputes between the riparian states.

Answer: C

Correct answer: Rajasthan

The Thar, or Great Indian Desert, covers about 200,000 square kilometres, the greater part of it in western Rajasthan, with extensions into Gujarat, Haryana and Punjab and across the border into Pakistan’s Sindh and Punjab. It is unusual among deserts for being densely populated for its type, supporting pastoralism and, since the Indira Gandhi Canal brought Sutlej water south, irrigated agriculture in parts of it. Its aridity has an unusual cause. It lies at the same latitude as the monsoon-fed regions to its east, but the monsoon current runs parallel to the Aravalli range rather than being forced up over it, so little rain is released; and the northwestern winter depressions arrive already dry. It is also India’s best region for solar and wind generation, and the site of the Desert National Park, home to the great Indian bustard.

Answer: C

The deepest point on Earth is the Challenger Deep in the Mariana Trench, about 10,994 m below sea level in the western Pacific.

The Caspian and Lake Assal are the lowest inland water surfaces, but they lie only tens of metres below sea level.

Answer: D

Latitude measures how far north or south a place lies, as an angle at the earth's centre measured from the plane of the equator. It runs from 0° at the equator to 90° at each pole.

Answer: D

Correct answer: Jupiter

Jupiter’s magnetic field is about twenty thousand times stronger than the Earth’s and is by far the largest structure in the solar system after the Sun’s own heliosphere - if its magnetosphere were visible from Earth it would appear several times the width of the full Moon. The field is generated by a dynamo in a deep layer of metallic hydrogen, hydrogen compressed so hard by the planet’s gravity that it conducts electricity like a metal. Rapid rotation, under ten hours, drives the dynamo hard. Its radiation belts are correspondingly fierce, intense enough to damage spacecraft electronics, which is why probes such as Juno fly highly elliptical orbits that limit their time in the worst of it. Saturn has a similar but weaker field, Neptune’s is oddly tilted and offset from its centre, and Earth’s is the weakest of the four.

Answer: B

The main European mountain systems are the Alps, Carpathians, Pyrenees and Apennines, all raised by the collision of the African and Eurasian plates.

The Andes are in South America, the Rockies in North America and the Himalayas in Asia, so any option containing them is wrong.