Brazil’s Amazon suffers: rivers fall to lowest level in at least 121 years

The Negro River, the second largest tributary of the Amazon, reached its lowest level on Monday. since official measurements began near Manaus 121 years ago . The filing confirms that this part of the world’s largest rainforest is suffering its worst drought, just over two years after its biggest flood.

The morning, The water level in the city’s port fell to 13.5 meters , compared to the 30.02 meters recorded in June 2021, its highest level ever recorded. The Negro River drains approximately 10% of the Amazon basin and is the sixth largest in the world in terms of water volume.

The Madeira River, another major tributary of the Amazon, also recorded historically low levels, causing paralysis of the Santo Antonio hydroelectric dam the fourth largest in Brazil.

Across the Brazilian Amazon, low river levels have left hundreds of riverside communities isolated and facing difficulties accessing drinking water. The drought has also disrupted commercial shipping that supplies Manaus. a city of 2 million inhabitants with a large industrial park.

Manaus is the largest city and capital of Amazonas, the state most affected by drought. End of September, 55 of the 62 municipalities have entered a state of emergency due to the severe drought.

“There is no more water to cross. “The sailing is over,” boatman Cledson Lopes Brasil told The Associated Press.

Brazil operates the port of Marina do Davi, a destination for dozens of waterfront communities, some with sandy beaches that attract tourists. The once bustling area is now surrounded by parched land, with many high, dry boathouses.

Over the past month, Brazil has switched to a less powerful boat, more suited to shallow waters. However, it cannot reach most communities along the Taruma-Açu, a tributary of the Negro River. Some residents have to walk up to three hours to get to their homes, and tourism has completely stopped.

Manaus and other nearby towns also suffer from high temperatures and dense smoke from fires set by humans for deforestation and pasture clearing. Drought is also the probable cause of dozens of deaths of river dolphins in Lake Téfé. near the Amazon River.

It’s an incredible contrasts with July 2021, when the waters of the Negro River invaded part of the center of Manaus. The historic flood, which also destroyed the crops of hundreds of riverside communities, lasted about three months.

The Negro River ends near Manaus, where it converges with the Amazon River, called in Brazil the Solimoes River upstream of this confluence. On Brazilian maps, this marks the beginning of the Amazon, with the Negro being the second major tributary. However, on international maps, the Amazon River begins in Peru.

Philip Fearnside, an American researcher at Brazil’s National Amazon Research Institute, a state agency, expects the situation to deteriorate, both during the current event and in the future. with increasing frequency and severity of climate change-type events.

He said surface waters in the eastern equatorial Pacific Ocean are now warmer than during the 2015-2016 El Niño “Godzilla” event and are expanding. In the Amazon, these Warming of the Pacific mainly causes droughts in the northern part of the region.

In addition, a patch of warm water in the tropical North Atlantic Ocean causes drought in the southern part of the Amazon, similar to that of 2005 and 2010 according to the researchers.

“Forecasts indicate that the arrival of rains will be delayed than normal and that the wet season will be drier than normal,” Fearnside said. “This could result not only extremely low water levels this year, but also low levels in 2024 . While waiting for the start of the rainy season in the basin, the situation already underway is expected to worsen. »