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River

Ch'ongch'on River

217 km from source to mouth · North Korea.

North KoreaNorth KoreaFlows into Yellow Sea3rd longest in North Korea

Follow the riverMonth by month

SourceMouth
The river and every tributary in its basin, drawn from RiverATLAS (CC BY 4.0).

In numbers

Length

217km

Average flow

120m³/s

Basin

9,553km²

Drop

375m

from 378 m to 3 m

Country

1

The journey

From source to mouth

217 km of river and 3 stops on the way: 3 towns and cities on its banks, dams, bridges and the tributaries that feed it.

378 m3 m
Rangrim Mountainsat 378 m0 km
Kujang-ŭp19,522 people130 km
Anju50,196 people191 km
Yellow Seaat 3 m217 km
050100150217 km
  1. 0 kmRangrim Mountainsat 378 m
  2. 130 kmKujang-ŭp19,522 people
  3. 191 kmAnju50,196 people
  4. 200 kmSinanju15,693 people
  5. 217 kmYellow Seaat 3 m

Water level along the river (RiverATLAS; the height is exaggerated). Towns: GeoNames and Wikidata; bridges, dams and tributaries: Wikidata.

River in North Korea

At the mouth it carries 116 m³/s on average: an Olympic pool every 22 seconds. It drops from 378 m to 3 m, 1.7 m per kilometre on average. Its basin covers 9,553 km², about the size of CY. 1.2 million people live in it. Highest water: from August to September; lowest: from December to March. Its dams hold back little of its water (3.4% of a year's flow).

Read more on Wikipedia

Where to start

  • AnjuLargest city on its banks · 50,196 people
  • Pyongyang Sunan International Airport (FNJ)Nearest airport with scheduled flights, 44 km from the cityCar hire in SeoulDiscover Cars · Affiliate link
  • On the water2 ferry piers, marinas, boat rentals and boat ramps along the river (OpenStreetMap)
  • From May to June and SeptemberThe best months to visit

Ch'ongch'on River, month by month

Highest water: from August to September

Lowest water: from December to March. Freezing months (average below −4 °C): from December to February. Best months to visit: from May to June and September.

26
-8°13 mmJan
11
-6°14 mmFeb
61
1°28 mmMar
76
9°48 mmApr
100
15°82 mmMay
100
20°98 mmJun
270
24°293 mmJul
380
23°265 mmAug
360
18°121 mmSep
210
10°49 mmOct
100
2°36 mmNov
45
-6°16 mmDec
Water (estimated flow)Air (average) Rain (mm)Best months

From about 11 m³/s in the lowest month to 380 m³/s in the highest. An estimate: the monthly flow is modelled from the lowest and highest months of WaterGAP (RiverATLAS, 1971–2000) and the rain and snow along the river (WorldClim). Dams change the real rhythm. The chip is the average air temperature; below it, the month's rain.

Plan the trip

Plan the trip: boat trips, a bed by the river, a car

Car hire in SeoulDiscover CarsSee 

Some links above are affiliate links: if you book through them we may earn a commission, at no extra cost to you. It never changes what the data on this page says.

The basin

Ch'ongch'on River: the basin in numbers

5,717 km² of land send their water to this river. This is what lives on it.

Lightly regulatedReservoirs can hold 3.4% of a year's flow.
  • 1.2millionpeople live in the basin
  • 213/km²people per km²
  • 399maverage altitude of the basin
  • 1,086mmof rain a year (basin average)
  • 6.8°Caverage air temperature
  • 3%protected areas
  • 0.3%covered by lakes
  • 0.1km³held in reservoirs

What covers the basin

  • 79% Forest
  • 20% Cropland
  • 4% Pasture
  • 10% Towns and cities

RiverATLAS (HydroATLAS v1.0, CC BY 4.0): land cover, people, protected areas, glaciers and dams over the whole basin upstream of the mouth.

Along the river

Ch'ongch'on River: what you find on the way

  • 16DamsHuichon Dam, Huichon Power Station No. 4, Huichon Power Station No. 5 and 13 more
  • 6Weirs
  • 2Ferry piers

From OpenStreetMap, within 1.7 km of the river. Not mapped is not the same as not there.

From space

The source and the mouth, seen from orbit

Ch'ongch'on River: satellite view of the source
The source14 km across
Ch'ongch'on River: satellite view of the mouth
The mouth10 km across

Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 by EOX IT Services GmbH (contains modified Copernicus Sentinel data 2016), CC BY 4.0. The glowing line is the river as drawn by RiverATLAS.

Nearby

Rivers nearby

Yalu RiverChinaChina813 km600 m³/s106 km awayTaedong RiverNorth KoreaNorth Korea439 km310 m³/s98 km awayImjin RiverSouth KoreaSouth Korea274 km180 m³/s221 km awayBukhan RiverSouth KoreaSouth Korea482 km200 m³/s279 km awayLiao RiverChinaChina1,345 km630 m³/s345 km awayXiliao RiverChinaChina829 km100 m³/s410 km awayGeum RiverSouth KoreaSouth Korea395 km210 m³/s411 km away

Where these numbers come from

Name, length, placesWikidata (Q499266) · CC0
Course, profile, basinRiverATLAS v1.0 (HydroATLAS, Linke et al. 2019) · CC BY 4.0 — followed along the river network from the point given by Wikidata
FlowWaterGAP (RiverATLAS), 1971–2000 · CC BY 4.0
Climate along the riverWorldClim (RiverATLAS), 1970–2000 · CC BY 4.0
Towns, bridges, damsWikidata · CC0; GeoNames · CC BY 4.0
Along the river© OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL
ImagesEOX Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 · CC BY 4.0; Wikimedia Commons

Every source and licence is on the data sources page.

The family

Do you prefer beaches, lakes, mountains, waterfalls, islands, rivers or canyons?

Same idea, other landscapes: field atlases built on open data, month by month, in seven languages.

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