{"id":98560,"date":"2026-04-16T13:39:19","date_gmt":"2026-04-16T08:09:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/?p=98560"},"modified":"2026-04-16T14:23:09","modified_gmt":"2026-04-16T08:53:09","slug":"key-facts-about-potomac-river","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/key-facts-about-potomac-river\/","title":{"rendered":"Potomac River"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2><b>Potomac River Latest News<\/b><\/h2>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">American Rivers, a United States conservation organisation working to make every river clean and healthy for people and wildlife, has nominated the Potomac, the river that flows through Washington, DC as America\u2019s most endangered river for 2026.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><b>About Potomac River<\/b><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It is a river in the <\/span><b>east central United States.<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><b>Course<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">:\u00a0<\/span>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It <\/span><b>rises <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">in <\/span><b>North and South branches in the Appalachian Mountains<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> of West Virginia.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It <\/span><b>flows through West Virginia, Maryland, Virginia, Pennsylvania, and Washington, D.C.,<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> before<\/span><b> entering Chesapeake Bay, <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">the <\/span><b>largest U.S. estuary.<\/b><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Its course is<\/span><b> 616 km<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, of which <\/span><b>188 km are tidal.<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It is the <\/span><b>fourth largest river along the Atlantic coast<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and the 21st largest in the United States.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Potomac\u2019s <\/span><b>tributaries <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">include the <\/span><b>Shenandoah, the Monocacy, and the Anacostia.<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The river is <\/span><b>navigable to Washington, D.C.,<\/b> <b>above which it descends from the Piedmont<\/b> <b>in a series of rapids and falls, including Great Falls<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, a cataract about 35 feet (11 metres) high.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Potomac, noted for its beauty, is also rich in <\/span><b>historical significance.\u00a0<\/b>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Potomac River is situated in an <\/span><b>area rich in American history,<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> which has led to th<\/span><b>e river&#8217;s nickname, &#8220;The Nation&#8217;s River&#8221;.<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><b>During the Civil War<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, the Potomac <\/span><b>River divided the Union from the Confederacy.\u00a0 <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It also <\/span><b>gave name to the Union&#8217;s largest army,<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> the <\/span><b>Army of the Potomac.<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><b>In 1864, Washington, D.C. began using the Potomac River<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> as its principal <\/span><b>source of drinking water<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> when the Washington Aqueduct was opened.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><b>Mount Vernon, home of George Washington,<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> is <\/span><b>on its banks<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> below Washington, D.C.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The river\u2019s name derives from \u201cPatawomeck,\u201d as it was recorded by the colonist John Smith in 1608.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Source: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.downtoearth.org.in\/rivers\/the-potomac-flowing-through-washington-dc-is-americas-most-endangered-river-in-2026-study\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">DTE<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Potomac River is a river in the east central United States. Read more about Potomac River, Origin, Drainage, Features, Flora, Fauna, Latest News.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":98590,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[5029,21,22,23],"class_list":{"0":"post-98560","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-upsc-prelims-current-affairs","8":"tag-potomac-river","9":"tag-prelims-pointers","10":"tag-upsc-current-affairs","11":"tag-upsc-prelims-current-affairs","12":"no-featured-image-padding"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98560","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=98560"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98560\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":98596,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98560\/revisions\/98596"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/98590"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=98560"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=98560"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=98560"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}