Why is it so cold in mount kilimanjaro?

Why has Mount Kilimanjaro have snow on top of it?

  • Doing geography homework about climate, please help!!

  • Answer:

    It is very, very cold up there. As liquid precipitation falls, it freezes causing it to turn into snow or hail. This will melt, causing meltwater flow to make a stream wich will join a river further down. I am of course talking about mountains in general.

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It's very cold. It actually (just about) still has glaciers! Edit: to expand on my answer: It was interesting to travel from an arid, near desert, through cloud forest of thick woods, through to an alpine desert. We were above the clouds near the top. Most of the water falling on Kilimanjaro falls onto the slopes. It's only when higher cloud forms does it snow at the top. In the last 30 odd years less snow has been falling and the glaciers are in retreat. I was there about 15 years ago and it was clear then that the glaciers had retreated. There isn't much permanant ice left there now, I gather. And the thumbs down? That's YA, I guess.

Robert D

Every 1000m you ascend there is a drop in temperature by 6.5 degrees. Now get the height and do the math..........see simple

NICHOLAS G

If the peak of a mountain is high enough, higher than the dew point of the surrounding air, then there will always be a propensity for some kind of precipitation. If there are cold air currents with a high relative humidity added to the mix, then all the prerequisites for a snow topped peak have been fulfilled. Uluru (formerly Ayer's Rock) in the red heart of Australia, is high enough to make clouds form when there is 1000k of desert surrounding it in every direction. I am sure that if that air was cold and moist enough, it would cause rain to fall. Even colder...we would get snow.

Tommy R

Because the higher up you go the colder it gets, and Mt Kilimanjaro is very high up so it's really cold and there's snow up there.

Top Contributor

Isn't is also true that at lower temperature (which is at higher altitudes), water freezes more easily?

Danny

Because Its Really Cold At The Top, So Instead Of Raining, It Snows.

x-HannahRASPBERRY-x

because of the very low temperatures up there sometimes I think that in winter, maybe in snows a little bit but the snow melts before it even reaches the ground... i would like to find out though

Cloudy(:

high altitude its cold up there

Bo P

cos its cold?

dilly

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