This modern Chinese-built town is named after the Sengge Zangbo river, the main headwater of the Indus River, on whose banks it is located. It is called "Sengge Zangbo" or "Sengge Khabab" in Tibetan and "Shiquanhe" in Chinese.[a]
Being the headquarters of Ngari Prefecture (which is known in Chinese under the Sinicized form of its name, Ali Prefecture), the town is also commonly known in English as Ngari or Ali (Chinese: 阿里; pinyin: Ālǐ) Town; this is what many guidebooks use as the primary name for the town.[2]
In Tibetan, Ngari is only the name for the prefecture, and not the town.
In 1965, the capital was moved from Günsa to the newly built Shiquanhe town in 1965, due to the extremely difficult living conditions at the former. At that time, Shiquanhe had a population of 400 people.[1]
Shiquanhe is a modern Chinese-style town, situated at the confluence of the Sengge River and the Longchu River.[4] According to a government-affiliated source, the population of Shiquanhe had grown from just over 1,500 to over 20,000 in 30 years (1978–2008), and people there now "enjoy their life because the city has been equipped with culture and commerce facilities".[5] Western guidebook writers have referred to the place as a "concrete monstrosity of a town".[2]
Shiquanhe has a lion statue in the middle of the town.[2] It has high-rise buildings, restaurants, general stores and nightclubs.[4] There are several primary schools and a secondary school.[1]
It also has two banks, one of which, the Agricultural Bank of China, near the army post west of the roundabout, has foreign exchange facilities. There is also a post and telecom office.[2]
History
Sketch map of Gar and Sengge valleys, Henry Strachey, 1851
Even though Shiquanhe is a modern town, its location has been of significant importance in history. Not only is it situated in a wide valley of Sengge Zangbo with an abundance of cultivable land, it also lies along a trade route between Gar Gunsa and Rudok, which continues on to Ladakh in the west via the Pangong Lake, and, in the other direction, to Lhasa via the Mayum La pass. The region was historically known as Rala (Chinese: 热拉). (See Strachey's map.)
During the Tibetan Era of Fragmentation in the 10th century, Kyide Nyimagon, a descendant of emperor Langdarma, came to Ngari in the midst of chaos in Central Tibet and started a new kingdom in Rala. He is said to have started by building a Kharmar (reddish fort) in the region, also called Ralajong.[6][b] Later he expanded into the Sutlej Valley and Burang by marrying a princess of Burang.[8] This kingdom came to be known as Guge-Purang.
By the 17th century, Ladakh annexed the entire kingdom of Guge and invited retaliation from Central Tibet under the 5th Dalai Lama. The large of army of Galdan Chhewang, Tibet's general, encamped in the Gar Valley.[9] The first clash with the Ladakhi forces took place near the confluence of the Gartang and Sengge Zangbo, with the locations Langmar and Rala mentioned in the sources.[10] The Ladakhis were defeated and Galdan Chhewang pursued them to Ladakh, leading to the Tibet–Ladakh–Mughal War and the Treaty of Tingmosgang.
Transportation
Ngari Gunsa Airport, near the town of Shiquanhe, started operations on 1 July 2010, becoming the fourth civil airport in Tibet.[11]Air China operates two flights a week from Chengdu to Ngari Gunsa via Lhasa, on Tuesdays and Fridays.[12]
China, Japan, and South Korea are currently in talks to construct a large high-altitude observatory on a ridge 25 km (16 mi) south of Shiquanhe, which was selected after a series of site surveys through Tibet and western China for candidate sites. Atmospheric conditions from the site's elevation 5,050 m (16,570 ft) above sea level have been roughly characterized, initial facilities (including two small domes) have been built, and a 25 cm pathfinder telescope project is in place as of 2012, with 50 and 60 cm telescopes planned for 2013 and 2014 and a 3 m telescope in the indefinite future: but the ambitions for the site include the possibilities of megaprojects like a 30 m-class competitor to E-ELT and a 10–20 m class spectrometer as a sequel to LAMOST.[16][unreliable source?][17]
Also planned for the site[18] is the Ali CMB Polarization Telescope (AliCPT) for studying the polarization of the cosmic microwave background(CMB).[19] This location is, during winter, as high and dry (and thus good for observations as) the South Pole location of the similar BICEP and Keck Array telescopes,[18] with the tremendous logistical advantage of being 30 minutes' drive from the airport and city.[19]: 7
Construction has begun on the telescope, codenamed Ngari No.1, and it is expected to enter operations in 2023.[20]
It is subsequently officially named AliCPT-1.
AliCPT-1 will be deployed in the middle latitude of the Northern Hemisphere, on the site of Ngari(Ali) Prefecture of Tibet, on a high peak of the Gangdise mountain, 32°18'38"N, 80°01'50"E at 5,250 m (17,220 ft) above sea level (B1 site), Fig. 7. The B1 site is located 20 km away from the Ngari Gunsa Airport, with convenient transportation. The closest city, Shiquanhe located at 4,255 m (13,960 ft) above sea level, is only 30 km away from the B1 site.
After several years of construction, the B1 site provides excellent conditions for carrying out CMB experiments. Infrastructure construction is complete, such as road construction, and has been connected to the city electricity power supply. AliCPT-1 will be operated from a new observatory building built by the Institute of High Energy Physics (IHEP), 850 m² including the operation hall and additional rooms. The site is equipped with three weather stations monitoring pressure, wind speed and direction, and temperature. Grid power, already ready for operation, is the main power source on site; solar panels, a diesel power generator, and a UPS power backup system are also in place. The site is also equipped with high-speed wired data service, full environmental heater/air conditioner units, and all the facilities needed to assemble and operate the receiver, including a crane and a workshop in a high-bay room. For human safety, an on-site oxygen system is present.[21]
Notes
^The name Shiquanhe is originally the name of the river; in Tibetan, it is Sengge Zangbo (in SASM/GNC/SRC transcriptions, sometimes simply Senge Zangbo),[1]Senge Zangbu (森格藏布) or Sengghe Tsangpo (in a transcription used in Western books).[2]
The source of that river, a hot spring supposedly resembles a lion's mouth; hence the name, interpreted as "river flowing from lion's mouth".[1][2]
^ abLi, Yong-Ping; Liu, Yang; Li, Si-Yu; Li, Hong; Zhang, Xinmin (27 November 2017). "Tibet's Ali: A New Window to Detect the CMB Polarization". arXiv:1709.09053 [astro-ph.IM].
^Xinhua News Agency (7 January 2017). "China to set up gravitational wave telescopes in Tibet". China Daily. Archived from the original on 12 January 2017. Construction has started for the first telescope, code-named Ngari No.1, 30 km south of Shiquanhe Town in Ngari Prefecture, said Yao Yongqiang, chief researcher with the National Astronomical Observatories of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. The telescope, located 5,250 meters above sea level, will detect and gather precise data on primordial gravitational waves in the Northern Hemisphere. It is expected to be operational by 2023.
^Maria Salatino, Jason E. Austermann, Keith L. Thompson (24 January 2021). "The design of the Ali CMB Polarization Telescope receiver". In Zmuidzinas, Jonas; Gao, Jian-Rong (eds.). Millimeter, Submillimeter, and Far-Infrared Detectors and Instrumentation for Astronomy X. p. 159. arXiv:2101.09608. doi:10.1117/12.2560709. ISBN9781510636934. S2CID230572121.((cite book)): CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
