The largest river in the world is the Amazon
More recently, in all geographicalhandbooks and school textbooks reported that the longest river on our planet is the Nile. Today scientists believe differently and say that the biggest river in the world is the Amazon. In their opinion, there are several reasons for this. After the construction of the Aswan Dam in 1960, the Nile became shorter, and new studies and refinements made using satellite data showed that the Amazon with its source of Ucayali has a total length exceeding seven thousand kilometers, which is much larger than that of the Nile.
Record indicators of the Amazon
But the Amazon, except for the longest length, is the holder of several more records. It has the largest basin in the area - almost 7.2 million km2. And the Amazon is the most abundant river in the world. Due to the abundance of rainfall regularly falling in the area of the equator in the vast territory of its basin, it takes out about 643 billion liters of fresh water to the Atlantic Ocean every hour.
More than 500 tributaries flow into the Amazon. And many of them are large independent water streams. The largest of the left tributaries is Rio Negro, and the most significant of the right is Madeira. If you add together the length of all the reservoirs of the basin, their total length will exceed twenty-five thousand kilometers.
The largest river in the world at the point of its confluenceUcayali has a width of 2 km, in the middle reaches - 5 km, and in the lower - 15-20 km, and in some places it reaches 80 km. While sailing on a boat in the middle of the riverbed, you can not even see the shore. The fact that you are swimming yet on the river, and not by sea, can be determined only by the color of the water. Due to the large amount of sand and silt in the water, it is yellow and cloudy.
The mouth of the Amazon is another recordindicators. The width of the largest delta in the world reaches 325 kilometers. More than half the length of the channel from the Atlantic Ocean is navigable. So it turns out that absolutely in all respects the Amazon is really the largest river in the world.
Beauty of the Amazon
Admiring wild beauty and paying tribute to herpowerful force, the indigenous Amazon Indians are respectfully called the "Queen of the Rivers". The rich and extremely diverse plant world, the bright saturated colors of the equatorial forest, its yellow waters and the dark waters of the tributaries rightfully affirm that it is the most beautiful river in the world.
Only on its banks you can see thisan amazing combination of unusual trees. Papaya is appreciated by its fruits, mahogany - wood, cinchona - bark, hevea - juice, from which rubber is made, and there is also a chocolate tree. And all this diversity is interwoven with lianas, forming a solid green wall along the coast. And on the calm surface of the water in countless jams and old men the biggest water lily is rocking - Victoria Regia, whose leaves reach one and a half meters in diameter.
The largest river in the world is famous for its uniquefauna. More than 2,5 thousand species of fish live in its turbid waters, including the famous piranhas, river sharks, pink dolphins, huge rays, two-meter electric eels and fish-ox.
