Key Facts about Amazon River
17-10-2023
1 min read
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Overview:
The Amazon River fell to its lowest level in over a century recently.
About Amazon River:
- It is the world's largest river by water volume and width.
- It is the second-longest river in the world after the Nile.
- Course:
- Its journey begins high in the Andes Mountains.
- The river then makes its way east through thousands of miles of rainforests and lowlands until it empties into the Atlantic Ocean on the northeastern coast of Brazil.
- Length: 6,400 km
- Width: During the dry season, the width of the Amazon River can be 4 km to 5 km in places – and in the wet season, this can increase to 50 km.
- Drainage:
- It has the largest drainage area of any river system.
- Its watershed spans the countries of Brazil, Peru, Ecuador, Colombia, Venezuela, and Bolivia.
- Roughly two-thirds of the Amazon’s main stream and by far the largest portion of its basin are within Brazil.
- Water Discharge:
- The Amazon releases high amounts of freshwater into the Atlantic Ocean at 300,000 m3 per second.
- It accounts for one-fifth of the total volume of freshwater entering the oceans globally.
- Tributaries:
- It has more than 1,100 tributaries, of which seventeen measures over 1,500-kilometers long.
- Notable tributaries include the Rio Negro, the Madeira River, and the Xingu River, among many others.
- The Amazon Rainforest, which represents about half of the Earth’s remaining rainforest, also constitutes its single largest reserve of biological resources.
- It is sometimes referred to as the "lungs of the Earth" due to its role in regulating the planet's oxygen and carbon cycles.
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Q1) What is a drainage basin?
A drainage basin is an area of land where water from rain or snow melt drains downhill into a body of water such as a river, lake, wetland or ocean. The drainage basin includes both the streams and rivers that convey the water as well as the land surface from which water drains into those channels.
Source:Amazon River falls to lowest in over a century amid Brazil drought