2,436 articles
Han
Han: name of two East Asian rivers. The Chinese Hanjiang (汉江), 1,577 km, is the Yangtze's largest tributary and source of the South-to-North Water Diversion Middle Route; the Korean Han River flows through Seoul.
Han River (Korea)
Han River (한강), Korea's largest river by discharge, 514.8 km, formed by the South and North Han at Yangsuri, flowing through Seoul to the Yellow Sea; historic Joseon capital river, engineered 1967–1986, now restored with parks.
Hanauma Bay
Hanauma Bay, on Oʻahu's southeastern coast, Hawaiʻi, is a curved bay in a breached volcanic tuff cone, the state's first Marine Life Conservation District (1967), capped at 1,400 nonresident visitors daily and known for its reef fish biomass and COVID-era recovery.
Hangzhou Bay (杭州湾)
Hangzhou Bay (杭州湾) is a funnel-shaped tidal bay on China's east coast, the Qiantang River estuary known for its tidal bore and 36 km bridge.
Hankow Reef
Hankow Reef (Yomba) is a submarine stratovolcano with summit at -5 m in the Bismarck Volcanic Arc, Papua New Guinea, between Bagabag and Crown Islands; linked to the legendary destroyed island of Yomba, with no confirmed Holocene eruptions.
Haraldskær Woman
Haraldskær Woman (Haraldskærkvinden), also long called Queen Gunhild, is a Danish Iron Age bog body found 20 October 1835 in Haraldskær Mose near Vejle; about 40 years old at death, strangled, never conserved, displayed at Kulturmuseet Vejle.
Hauraki Gulf
The Hauraki Gulf (Tīkapa Moana) is a large embayment on New Zealand's northeast North Island coast, home to the 1.2-million-hectare Hauraki Gulf Marine Park (2000), over 200 islands, Bryde's whales, and the 2025 Marine Protection Act.
Havasu Falls
Havasu Falls (Havasuw Hagjahgeevma) is a waterfall on Havasu Creek in Havasu Canyon, on the Havasupai Indian Reservation in Arizona, known for its blue-green water and travertine pools.
Hawaii hotspot
Hawaii hotspot: the volcanic center, also called the Hawaiian plume, that built the 5,800 km Hawaiian-Emperor chain over ~76 million years as the Pacific plate moved over a mantle plume, now under Mauna Loa, Kīlauea, and Lōʻihi.
Hawizeh Marsh
Hawizeh Marsh (Haur Al-Hawizeh), a transboundary Mesopotamian wetland on the Iraq–Iran border (Iranian part Haur Al-Azim), Iraq's first Ramsar site (2007, 137,700 ha), Montreux Record 2010, degraded by dams and drought.
Hawkesbury River
Hawkesbury River (New South Wales): drowned river-valley estuary entering Broken Bay, named by Arthur Phillip in 1789 after Baron Hawkesbury; 21,624 km2 catchment, Sydney's water source, and NSW's highest flood-risk valley.
Hay (landform)
Hay, the Hay River (Kátł'odehé, "willow grass river"), is a 1,114 km river flowing through Alberta, British Columbia, and the Northwest Territories into Great Slave Lake.
Hecate Strait
Hecate Strait (Siigaay) is a 50–100 km wide seaway between Haida Gwaii and mainland British Columbia, named after HMS Hecate by Captain Richards in 1861–62; stormy, macrotidal, with glass sponge reef MPAs.
HELCOM
HELCOM (Helsinki Commission, Baltic Marine Environment Protection Commission) is the intergovernmental body governing Baltic Sea marine environmental protection under the 1974/1992 Helsinki Convention, with ten Contracting Parties, the Baltic Sea Action Plan, and six-year HOLAS assessments.
Hell Gate
Hell Gate (Dutch Hellegat) is the treacherous tidal strait of the East River between Wards Island and Astoria, Queens, New York City, where currents reach 4 knots; its rocks were blasted away at Hallett's Point in 1876 and Flood Rock on October 10, 1885. Not the Hell Gate news outlet or bridge alone.
Hellenic Trench
Hellenic Trench: deep seafloor depression system south and west of Greece marking the Hellenic subduction zone foredeep; about 2,000 km long, Mediterranean's deepest waters at 5,267 m, highest regional seismicity, and key sperm whale habitat.
Helmand
The Helmand, also known as Hirmand, is the longest river in Afghanistan, running about 800 miles from the Hindu Kush to the Hamun wetlands near Iran.
Helvellyn
Helvellyn is a 950 m mountain in England's Lake District and its third highest peak, best known for the arêtes Striding Edge and Swirral Edge above Red Tarn.
Henry Hudson
Henry Hudson (c. 1565–disappeared 1611), English navigator, led four voyages (1607–1611) for the Muscovy Company, Dutch East India Company, and English backers seeking a passage to Asia; explored the Hudson River, Hudson Strait, and Hudson Bay; set adrift by mutineers in June 1611 and never seen again.
Hernando de Soto
Hernando de Soto (c. 1500–1542), Spanish conquistador of Extremadura, helped Pizarro conquer the Inca and led the 1539–1543 expedition through the American Southeast, first Europeans to reach the Mississippi River, where he died of fever.
Hero Bay
Hero Bay is a 17-mile-wide bay indenting the north side of Livingston Island, South Shetland Islands, Antarctica, between Cape Shirreff and Williams Point; named for the sloop Hero of Nathaniel B. Palmer's 1820-21 sealing fleet.
Hess Rise
Hess Rise (Mellish Rise) is a >1,000-km-long oceanic plateau in the central North Pacific, named for Harry H. Hess, formed roughly 100 Ma near the Pacific-Farallon Ridge and drilled at DSDP Sites 310, 464, 465, 466.
Hikurangi Plateau
Hikurangi Plateau: Cretaceous oceanic large igneous province east of New Zealand, fragment of the proposed Ontong Java Nui super-plateau with Ontong Java and Manihiki; rifted ~120 Ma, collided with Gondwana ~105 Ma, now subducting beneath the North Island.
Hilton Inlet
Hilton Inlet, also Hilton Bay or Ensenada Hilton, is an ice-filled inlet on the east coast of Palmer Land, Antarctica, between Cape Darlington and Cape Knowles, discovered by USAS in 1940 and named for surveyor Donald C. Hilton.
Hinatuan Enchanted River
The Hinatuan Enchanted River, also called the Enchanted River, is a deep blue river in Hinatuan, Surigao del Sur, Mindanao, Philippines, a leading tourist attraction since 2010.
Hirakud Dam (ହୀରାକୁଦ ବନ୍ଧ)
Hirakud Dam (ହୀରାକୁଦ ବନ୍ଧ), a composite earth, masonry, and concrete dam on the Mahanadi near Sambalpur, Odisha, inaugurated by Nehru in 1957; 25.8 km long with dykes, 743 km² reservoir, 307.5 MW power, irrigation, and delta flood control.
Hirakud Reservoir
Hirakud Reservoir is the lake behind the Hirakud Dam on the Mahanadi River at Sambalpur, Odisha, India; commissioned in 1957, it covers 743 km² and became a Ramsar site in 2021.
HMS Terror (1813)
HMS Terror (1813), Royal Navy bomb vessel built at Topsham, Devon; served in polar exploration with Back (1836-37), Ross's Antarctic voyage (1839-43), and Franklin's lost 1845 Northwest Passage expedition; wreck found in Terror Bay, 2016.
Hogenakkal Falls
Hogenakkal Falls (ஒகேனக்கல் நீர்வீழ்ச்சி) is a waterfall and bathing site on the Cauvery river in Tamil Nadu, India, at the river's entry from Karnataka, known for coracle rides.
Holston River
The Holston River is a 274-mile tributary of the Tennessee River that rises in the Blue Ridge foothills and flows through southwestern Virginia into eastern Tennessee.