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Karakoram
The most glaciated range outside the poles, home to K2
The Karakoram is the most savage and heavily glaciated mountain range outside the polar regions, a compact knot of rock and ice straddling the borders of Pakistan, China, and India. In roughly 500 kilometres it packs four of the world's fourteen peaks above 8,000 metres, crowned by K2, the second-highest mountain on Earth and, by reputation, the deadliest to climb. Its glaciers are among the longest outside the polar ice, rivers of ice winding for dozens of kilometres between sheer granite walls.
Like the Himalaya alongside it, the Karakoram was raised by the collision of the Indian and Eurasian plates, and it is still rising fast, its peaks among the most rapidly uplifting on Earth. The high point, K2, reaches 8,611 metres on the Pakistan-China border. The range is extraordinarily glaciated, holding the Siachen, Baltoro, and Biafo glaciers, and its concentration of giant peaks, sharp granite spires, and crevassed ice makes it a proving ground for the world's most ambitious mountaineers.
The Karakoram has long been more obstacle than thoroughfare, though its high passes carried strands of trade between Central Asia and the subcontinent. The Karakoram Highway, blasted through the range in the twentieth century, now links Pakistan and China across one of the highest paved border crossings in the world. The Baltoro region, ringed by K2, Broad Peak, and the Gasherbrums, is a magnet for climbers, while the contested Siachen Glacier has been the site of the highest-altitude military conflict in history.