Lena Pillars

The Lena Pillars are a chain of rock formations along the Lena River in eastern Siberia, about 180 kilometers from Yakutsk, rising 150 to 300 meters above the river. They are built from alternating layers of limestone, marlstone, dolomite and slate of Early to Middle Cambrian age, originally deposited in a shallow ancient sea and preserving horizontal banding that records repeated marine transgressions and regressions; the slate layers represent slightly metamorphosed deep-marine shale. Long-term weathering and erosion have picked apart these alternating hard and soft layers into the standing pillar and cliff forms visible today, with the densest concentration of pillars found between the villages of Petrovskoye and Tit-Ary. UNESCO recognized the site for its outstanding geological value when it inscribed the Lena Pillars Nature Park as a World Heritage Site. This entity documents the Lena Pillars specifically as a geological formation shaped by differential weathering of layered Cambrian sedimentary rock.