Puncak Jaya, sometimes called Mount Carstensz or the Carstensz Pyramid, is the highest mountain on the island of New Guinea, on the Australia-New Guinea continent and in Oceania. It is the highest point between the Himalayas and the Andes and the highest island peak in the world. The peak is located in what is variously called the Sudirman Range or the Dugunduguoo, in the western central highlands of Papua, the Indonesian western half of the island, and is the highest peak in the country.
Puncak Jaya was originally called 'Carstensz Pyramid', after Dutch explorer Jan Carstensz who first sighted the glaciers on the peak of the mountain on a rare clear day in 1623 (Carstensz was ridiculed in Europe when he said he had seen snow near the equator). This name is still used among mountaineers.[citation needed] Although the snowfield of Puncak Jaya was reached as early as 1909 by a Dutch explorer, Hendrik A. Lorentz, the peak was not climbed until 1962, by an expedition led by the Austrian mountaineer Heinrich Harrer (of Seven Years in Tibet fame) with three friends — Temple, Kippax and Huizenga.
When Indonesia took control of the province in the 1960s, the peak was renamed 'Puntjak Soekarno' (Simplified Indonesian: Puncak Sukarno) or Sukarno Peak, after the first President of Indonesia, later this was changed to Puncak Jaya. Puncak means peak or mountain and Jaya means 'victory', 'victorious' or 'glorious').
Elevation 4,884 metres (16,024 ft)[
Location Papua Province, Indonesia
Range Sudirman Range
Prominence 4,884 m (highest point on New Guinea) Ranked 9th
Coordinates 4°5′S 137°11′ECoordinates: [show location on an interactive map] 4°5′S 137°11′E
First ascent 1962 by Heinrich Harrer and 3 others
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