The
Lena (
Russian ??´??;
Sakha ??????,
Ölüöne) is the easternmost of the three great
Siberian rivers that flow into the Arctic Ocean (the other two being the
Ob River and the
Yenisei River). It is the
10th longest river in the world and has the 9th largest
watershed. It is the greatest
Russian river with its watershed entirely within national ranges.
Rising at the height of 1,640&_160;metres (5,381&_160;ft) at its source in the Baikal Mountains south of the Central Siberian Plateau, 7&_160;kilometres (4&_160;mi) west of Lake Baikal, the Lena flows northeast, being joined by the Kirenga River, Vitim River and Olyokma River. From Yakutsk it enters the lowlands and flows north until joined by its right-hand affluent the Aldan River. The Verkhoyansk Range deflects it to the north-west; then, after receiving its most important left-hand tributary, the Vilyuy River, it makes its way nearly due north to the Laptev Sea, a division of the Arctic Ocean, emptying south-west of the New Siberian Islands by the Lena Delta - 30,000&_160;square kilometres (11,583&_160;sq&_160;mi) in area,[2] and traversed by seven principal branches, the most important being Bykov, farthest east.
The total length of the river is estimated at 4,400&_160;km (2,800 mi). The area of the Lena river basin is calculated at 2,490,000&_160;square kilometres (961,394&_160;sq&_160;mi). Gold is washed out of the sands of the Vitim and the Olyokma, and mammoth tusks have been dug out of the delta. The Lena has the unusual distinction of appearing to be the longest river in the world when viewed on a map using a Mercator projection, the most common method of displaying the spherical earth on a flat surface, due to that projection's tendency to exaggerate the size of areas near the poles (the longer Amazon and Nile rivers both cross the equator.)
The Kirenga River flows north between the upper Lena and Lake Baikal. The Vitim River drains the area northeast of Lake Baikal. The Olyokma River flows north. The Amga River makes a long curve southeast and parallel to the Lena and flows into the Aldan. The Aldan River makes similar curve southeast of the Aldan and flows into the Lena north of Yakutsk. The Maya River, a tributary of the Aldan, drains an area almost to the Sea of Okhotsk. The T-shaped Chona-Vilyuy River system drains most of the area to the west.
