The largest river in the world is the Amazon

Until recently, in all geographical reference books and school textbooks it was reported that the longest river on our planet is the Nile. Today scientists think 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 km ² . And the Amazon is the most abundant river in the world. Due to the abundance of rainfall regularly falling in the equator's area on 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 we 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 confluence of the Ucayali is 2 km wide, in the middle reaches 5 km, and in the lower reaches 15-20 km, and in some places it reaches 80 km. Sailing on a boat in the middle of the riverbed, the shore can not be seen. The fact that you are swimming yet on the river, and not by sea, can be determined only by the color of the water. Because of the large amount of sand and silt in the water, it is yellow and cloudy.

The mouth of the Amazon is another record record. 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 its mighty power, 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 such an amazing combination of unusual trees. Papaya is valued for 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 unique fauna. 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-long electric eels and fish-ox.