World Geography Questions and Answers

Answer: C

Correct answer: The Dead Sea

The shore of the Dead Sea, on the border of Jordan, Israel and the West Bank, lies about 430 metres below sea level - the lowest exposed land on Earth, and still falling as the lake shrinks. It sits in the Jordan Rift Valley, part of the great system of faults running from Turkey to Mozambique where the Arabian and African plates are pulling apart. The basin has no outlet, so water leaves only by evaporation, which is why it is roughly ten times as salty as the ocean. Death Valley in California, at 86 metres below sea level, is the lowest point in North America; the Caspian Sea surface is about 28 metres below sea level; and Lake Eyre in Australia about 15 metres below. The lowest point of all is beneath the ocean, in the Mariana Trench, but that is not land.

Answer: A

Correct answer: Mars

Mars is the Red Planet, and the colour comes from iron oxide - rust - in the dust covering its surface. It is the fourth planet from the Sun and about half the Earth’s diameter. Its day is close to ours at 24 hours 37 minutes, and its axis is tilted by a similar amount, so it has seasons; but its atmosphere is thin and almost entirely carbon dioxide, and its average temperature is around −60°C. It carries the largest volcano in the solar system, Olympus Mons, and the vast canyon system of Valles Marineris. Abundant evidence of ancient river valleys and lake beds shows that liquid water once flowed there, which is why it is the main focus of the search for past life. It has two small moons, Phobos and Deimos, probably captured asteroids. India’s Mangalyaan reached Mars orbit in 2014 at the first attempt.

Answer: B

Correct answer: The Western and Eastern Ghats

The Deccan Plateau is flanked by the Western Ghats along the Arabian Sea and the Eastern Ghats along the Bay of Bengal, with the Satpura and Vindhya ranges marking its northern edge. The two are not alike. The Western Ghats are higher, continuous and close to the coast, and they intercept the southwest monsoon - which is why their windward slopes are among the wettest places in India while the plateau behind lies in a rain shadow. They are also a global biodiversity hotspot. The Eastern Ghats are lower, discontinuous, and broken by the deltas of the Godavari, Krishna and Kaveri, which cut through them on their way to the sea. The two meet in the south at the Nilgiri Hills. The plateau itself tilts gently eastward, which is why most of its rivers flow that way.

Answer: D

Wave energy is generated by wind, so it depends on the wind's intensity and strength, on how long it blows, and on the fetch. Water depth also shapes waves as they approach the shore. Currents are a separate movement of the water body itself and do not determine the strength of wave action.

Answer: C

The Suez Canal joins the Mediterranean Sea at Port Said to the Red Sea at Suez, cutting across the Isthmus of Suez in Egypt.

Opened in 1869 and about 193 km long, it is a sea-level canal with no locks, and it shortens the Europe–Asia voyage by some 7,000 km.

Answer: D

Puncak Jaya in the Indonesian province of Papua, at 4,884 m, is the highest peak in Oceania and the highest island peak in the world.

Mt. Wilhelm in Papua New Guinea reaches 4,509 m, Mt. Cook in New Zealand 3,724 m and Mt. Kosciuszko, the highest point of mainland Australia, only 2,228 m.

Answer: A

The Vindhya Range, running roughly east–west across central India, is the traditional dividing line between the Indo-Gangetic plain to the north and the peninsular plateau to the south.

The Aravallis lie in the north-west, the Nilgiris in the far south, and the Satpuras run parallel to and south of the Vindhyas rather than forming the divide.

Answer: C

Correct answer: The Sun, Earth and Moon are in a straight line

Spring tides occur when the Sun, Earth and Moon are aligned - at new moon and again at full moon - so that the tidal pulls of the Sun and Moon act along the same line and add together. High tides are then higher and low tides lower, giving the greatest range. When the Sun and Moon are at right angles, at the first and third quarters, their effects partly cancel and the range is least; these are neap tides. Each type recurs twice a lunar month, so the cycle alternates roughly every week. The name has nothing to do with the season. It comes from the sense of springing up, and spring tides occur every fortnight throughout the year. The Moon dominates because tidal force falls off with the cube of distance, so its nearness outweighs the Sun’s far greater mass; the Sun contributes about half as much.

Answer: A

Correct answer: Condensation

Condensation is the change from vapour to liquid, and it is what forms clouds. Rising air expands and cools; cooler air holds less water vapour, so once the parcel reaches saturation the surplus vapour condenses onto microscopic particles - dust, salt, smoke - called condensation nuclei. Without those nuclei the air would simply become supersaturated. The height at which this begins is the condensation level, which is why the flat bases of fair-weather cumulus clouds all sit at the same altitude on a given day. The other three are the neighbouring stages of the water cycle: evaporation turns liquid water to vapour, transpiration releases vapour from plant leaves, and infiltration is the soaking of water down into the soil.

Answer: B

Correct answer: Botswana

The Kalahari covers most of Botswana and extends into Namibia and South Africa, roughly 900,000 square kilometres of red sand across the interior plateau of southern Africa. It is a semi-desert rather than a true one: it receives more rain than the Sahara and carries grass and acacia scrub, so it supports substantial wildlife. Its distinguishing feature is that the sand absorbs the rain that falls, leaving almost no surface water. On its northern edge lies the Okavango Delta, where a river flows inland and evaporates rather than reaching the sea, creating a vast seasonal wetland in the middle of the dry country. The San people have lived in the Kalahari for millennia. Egypt and Morocco lie within the Sahara, and Nigeria is mostly tropical savanna and forest, with only its far north approaching the Sahel.