QandAs: Travel

What is Altitude?

Answer:
Altitude is defined as the vertical

distance or the height of an object from some datum plane which can be either a mean sea level or any reference point on the earth’s surface.

As the altitude increases the atmospheric pressure decreases and as the atmospheric pressure decreases the amount of oxygen present in the atmosphere also decreases and it will ultimately going to affect the health of an individual. Altitude is measured by the reduction in atmospheric pressure with height using instruments like Altimeter or Barometer.

Altitude is also a means of dividing the Earth Atmosphere into different regions like Troposphere, Stratosphere, Mesosphere, Thermosphere and Exosphere. The aviation sector classifies the Altitude in various types like: -
(a) Indicated Altitude which is measured by Altimeter.
(b) Absolute Altitude which is measured as the distance from the ground directly below the airplane.
(c) True Altitude which is measured by taking sea level as the reference point.
(d) Pressure Altitude which is measured in terms of Air Pressure.
(e) Density Altitude which is measured of density of the air.

The change in Altitude is also known to affect the physical capabilities of an athlete and therefore International Association of Athletic Federations (IAAF) also accepts these facts and do not record those performances which are achieved at more than 1000 meters of altitude.

Due to the less availability of oxygen at higher altitude there is a chance of developing medical problems like Acute Mountain Sickness, High Altitude Pulmonary Oedema (HAPE) and High Altitude Cerebral Oedema (HACE), etc. when traveling to such places. The various symptoms which may arise due to the above conditions are nausea, dizziness, vomiting, headache, epilepsy, etc.

Thus when traveling to higher Altitude places one must take certain precautions like drink lot of water, avoid alcohol & caffeine, and take some extra chlorophyll to improve oxygen carrying capacity of blood. However those who are living at high Altitude places tends to become adapted to those conditions and are not affected much but those who are not in habit of living in such conditions may take a longer time to get adapted varying from few days to months or years.