Chamdo

"Changdu" redirects here; not to be confused with Chengdu.

"Qamdo" redirects here. For other uses, see Chamdo (disambiguation).

This article is about the city known as Chamdo. For the town, see Chengguan, Chamdo. For the county formerly known as Chamdo, see Karuo District.

Chamdo, officially Qamdo^[2][3] (Tibetan: ཆབ་མདོ, Wylie: chab mdo, ZYPY: qamdo) and also known in Chinese as Changdu (Chinese: 昌都; pinyin: Chang Du),^[4] is a prefecture-level city in the eastern part of the Tibet Autonomous Region, China. Its seat is the town of Chengguan in Karuo District. Chamdo is Tibet's third largest city after Lhasa and Shigatse.^[5]

Qamdo 昌都市 ཆབ་མདོ་གྲོང་ཁྱེར།
Prefecture-level city
Mekong River to the south of Chamdo Town
Location of Qamdo Prefecture within China
Coordinates (Qamdo municipal government): 31°08′35″N 97°10′12″E
Country	People's Republic of China
Autonomous region	Tibet
County-level divisions	1 district 10 counties
Prefecture seat	Karub District (Chengguan)
Area
• Total	110,154 km2 (42,531 sq mi)
Elevation	3,240 m (10,630 ft)
Population  (2019)
• Total	798,067
• Density	7.2/km2 (19/sq mi)
GDP[1]
• Total	CN¥ 27.9 billion US$ 4.3 billion
• Per capita	CN¥ 36,574 US$ 5,668
Time zone	UTC+8 (China Standard)
ISO 3166 code	CN-XZ-03

Qamdo
"Qamdo" in Chinese characters
Chinese name
Chinese	昌都
Transcriptions Standard Mandarin Hanyu Pinyin Chāngdū
Tibetan name
Tibetan	ཆབ་མདོ།
Transcriptions Wylie chab mdo Tibetan Pinyin Qamdo

Chamdo is divided into 11 county-level divisions: one district and ten counties. The main district is Karuo District. Other counties include Jonda County, Gonjo County, Riwoche County, Dengqen County, Zhag'yab County, Baxoi County, Zognang County, Maarkam County, Lhorong County, and Banbar County.

History

Wang Qimei and Zhang Guohua led 40,000 People's Liberation Army soldiers in an attack against the 8,000 soldiers of the Tibetan Army defending Chamdo on 7 October 1950. Over 5,700 Tibetans died after fighting 21 battles by 19 October, and Provincial Governor Ngapoi Ngawang Jigme was captured.^[6] The fall of Chamdo resulted in the Tibeatan government submitting to China's demands.^[7]

On 11 July 2014 Chamdo Prefecture was upgraded into a prefecture-level city.^[8]

Languages

Languages spoken in Chamdo include Khams Tibetan and the Chamdo languages of Lamo, Larong, and Drag-yab.^[9]

Transportation

From 1951 to 1954, the Chinese army constructed a 2,300 kilometre long highway from Ya'an to Lhasa that went through Chamdo.^[10]

Subdivisions

Aerial view of Banbar County, Chamdo.

The city is subdivided into 11 county-level divisions: 1 district and 10 counties.

Map
Karuo Jomda County Gonjo County Riwoqê County Dêngqên County Zhag'yab County Baxoi County Zogang County Markam County Lhorong County Banbar County
Name	Hanzi	Hanyu Pinyin	Tibetan	Wylie	Population (2010 Census)	Area (km2)	Density (/km2)
Karuo District	卡若区	Kǎruò Qū	མཁར་རོ་ཆུས།	mkhar ro chus	116,500	10,794	10.79
Jomda County	江达县	Jiāngdá Xiàn	འཇོ་མདའ་རྫོང་།	'jo mda' rdzong	76,026	13,164	5.77
Gonjo County	贡觉县	Gòngjué Xiàn	གོ་འཇོ་རྫོང་།	go 'jo rdzong	40,434	6,323	6.39
Riwoqê County	类乌齐县	Lèiwūqí Xiàn	རི་བོ་ཆེ་རྫོང་།	ri bo che rdzong	49,870	6,355	7.84
Dêngqên County	丁青县	Dīngqīng Xiàn	སྟེང་ཆེན་རྫོང་།	steng chen rdzong	69,888	12,408	5.63
Zhag'yab County	察雅县	Cháyǎ Xiàn	བྲག་གཡབ་རྫོང་།	brag g-yab rdzong	56,789	8,251	6.88
Baxoi County	八宿县	Bāsù Xiàn	དཔའ་ཤོད་རྫོང་།	dpa' shod rdzong	39,021	12,336	3.16
Zogang County	左贡县	Zuǒgòng Xiàn	མཛོ་སྒང་རྫོང་།	mdzo sgang rdzong	44,320	11,837	3.74
Markam County	芒康县	Mángkāng Xiàn	སྨར་ཁམས་རྫོང་།	smar khams rdzong	81,399	11,576	7.03
Lhorong County	洛隆县	Luòlóng Xiàn	ལྷོ་རོང་རྫོང་།	lho rong rdzong	47,491	8,048	5.90
Banbar County	边坝县	Biānbà Xiàn	དཔལ་འབར་རྫོང་།	dpal 'bar rdzong	35,767	8,774	4.07

Climate

Chamdo has a humid continental climate (Köppen: Dwb) in the Karub District and an alpine subarctic climate (Köppen: Dwc) in other counties.

Climate data for Chamdo (Karuo District), elevation 3,315 m (10,876 ft), (1991–2020 normals, extremes 1981–2010)
Month	Jan	Feb	Mar	Apr	May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep	Oct	Nov	Dec	Year
Record high °C (°F)	21.8 (71.2)	21.4 (70.5)	26.1 (79.0)	28.1 (82.6)	29.5 (85.1)	32.7 (90.9)	32.0 (89.6)	30.8 (87.4)	30.5 (86.9)	27.7 (81.9)	22.3 (72.1)	20.2 (68.4)	32.7 (90.9)
Mean daily maximum °C (°F)	8.8 (47.8)	10.7 (51.3)	13.5 (56.3)	16.9 (62.4)	21.0 (69.8)	23.8 (74.8)	24.3 (75.7)	23.9 (75.0)	21.9 (71.4)	17.5 (63.5)	13.2 (55.8)	10.0 (50.0)	17.1 (62.8)
Daily mean °C (°F)	−1.5 (29.3)	1.4 (34.5)	4.8 (40.6)	8.3 (46.9)	12.4 (54.3)	15.6 (60.1)	16.4 (61.5)	15.8 (60.4)	13.4 (56.1)	8.4 (47.1)	2.8 (37.0)	−1.1 (30.0)	8.1 (46.5)
Mean daily minimum °C (°F)	−9.4 (15.1)	−6.4 (20.5)	−2.3 (27.9)	1.7 (35.1)	5.7 (42.3)	9.5 (49.1)	10.9 (51.6)	10.3 (50.5)	7.7 (45.9)	2.1 (35.8)	−4.6 (23.7)	−8.9 (16.0)	1.4 (34.5)
Record low °C (°F)	−19.4 (−2.9)	−17.4 (0.7)	−13.0 (8.6)	−7.7 (18.1)	−4.0 (24.8)	1.1 (34.0)	2.9 (37.2)	1.1 (34.0)	−0.9 (30.4)	−7.0 (19.4)	−13.6 (7.5)	−20.7 (−5.3)	−20.7 (−5.3)
Average precipitation mm (inches)	1.6 (0.06)	4.0 (0.16)	10.5 (0.41)	23.9 (0.94)	42.2 (1.66)	80.7 (3.18)	110.7 (4.36)	102.8 (4.05)	75.2 (2.96)	33.1 (1.30)	4.8 (0.19)	1.3 (0.05)	490.8 (19.32)
Average precipitation days (≥ 0.1 mm)	2.2	3.6	6.3	11.3	13.5	18.6	19.9	18.9	17.0	9.8	2.9	1.3	125.3
Average snowy days	3.9	7.3	11.0	6.9	0.6	0.1	0	0	0.1	2.9	4.8	2.9	40.5
Average relative humidity (%)	34	35	40	47	49	58	65	66	66	58	45	37	50
Mean monthly sunshine hours	204.1	184.8	202.9	201.4	215.1	188.9	190.2	192.6	192.4	199.0	205.0	212.3	2,388.7
Percentage possible sunshine	63	59	54	52	50	45	44	47	53	57	65	68	55
Source: China Meteorological Administration[11][12]

See also

• List of towns in Tibet by elevation