Kazbek

Kazbek

Mount. an extinct volcano in N Georgia in the central Caucasus Mountains. Height: 5047 m (16 558 ft.)

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Kazbek 

(Georgian Mkinvari, literally, “glacial”; Ossetian Urskhokh, literally, “white mountain”), a peak of the Bokovoi(Side) Range of the Greater Caucasus, rising above the valley of the Terek River near the Georgian Military Road. The easternis the main peak (altitude, 5, 033 m); the western summit is 400m lower. Kazbek is an extinct volcano 370 m tall set in a massifof lower Jurassic schist, which had yielded a series of lava flowsthat descended to the valley of the Terek River. Evidently Kaz-bek was active in Quaternary times, and now a small amount of solfatara activity is observed. The summit is covered with per-petual snow and neve, from which valley glaciers such as Suatisi, Mna, Ortsveri, Devdorakskii, and Chachskii descend along theslopes. The total area covered with ice is 135 sq km. There is ahigh-mountain meteorological station on the Gerget Glacier.The mountain is also a tourist resort.