Second-Largest River In S America Drying Up, Tigris And Euphrates Rivers Also Drying Up

The Parana River, the second-longest river in South America after the Amazon, is about to dry out, leaving millions in fear

Strange Sounds

The water levels of the Paraná river, the second-longest in South America after the Amazon, are at their lowest since 1944.

The river is key to commercial shipping and fishing but also provides 40 million people with drinking water.

A drought in the region means water levels have dipped so low that fishers’ livelihoods are at risk.

The Paraná is 4,880km (3,032 miles) long and flows south from south-east Brazil through Paraguay and Argentina.

It merges with the Paraguay and Uruguay rivers to form the Río de la Plata Basin.

“The Paraná is the largest, most biodiverse and the most important socio-productive wetland in Argentina,” explains geologist Carlos Ramonell.

Southern Brazil, where the Paraná’s source is located, has seen three years of below-average rainfalls.

The level of the river is so low that cargo ships have to reduce the amount of grains that are loaded for export.

The Paraguay river is also running very low

As a result, the Paraná’s flow rate has dropped from an average of 17,000 cubic meters a second to just 6,200.

The low water levels are causing problems for energy production with the hydroelectric plant that spans the Parana river between Argentina and Paraguay running at only 50%.

On Wednesday, Brazil’s Vice-President Hamilton Mourão warned that the drought could also lead to energy rationing in Brazil.

It is also hampering the transport of goods with ships not able to load up fully in case they run aground.

The Paraná is a key waterway for the transport of grains and the situation is forcing exporters to consider using land routes.

Catastrophic decline of Euphrates River water level

Egypt Today staff

 6 May 2021: Since the beginning of May, catastrophic scenes of tremendous decline in water level of Euphrates, the longest river of Western Asia, became a meme on social media platforms.

 

Under hashtag #الفرات_ينحسر (the Euphrates declines), Syrians posted photos of the water level of the river, showing how parts in along the river inside the Syrian lands dried up.

#الفرات_ينحسر #نهر_الفرات#نهر_الفرات_ينحسر pic.twitter.com/mlk6xeybBP

— Rukeya Muslim (@RukeyaMuslim) May 5, 2021

 

The Euphrates runs from Turkey to Syria and then to Iraq until it joins the Tigris in Shatt Al Arab in Iraq.

 

The Syrian regime accused Turkey of depriving Syrians of their water share of the Euphrates river, saying electricity production at the Euphrates Dam stopped and water level in Lake Al-Assad, the Syrian state-owned news agency SANA reported on Wednesday.

 

Over the past ten days, Turkey reduced the water flow to Syria from 500 to 200 cubic meters per second, suspending electricity production at the Euphrates Dam and led to a decrease in the irrigation ad drinking water, besides a remarkable depletion of Lake Assad, SANA said.

 

Hundreds of thousands of civilians living in the Euphrates Basin in the city of Al Jazeera are vulnerable to and humanitarian catastrophe.

 

Autonomous Administration of Northeastern Syria, which controlled by Kurds, announced that the water level at Lake Assad declined by three meters, Syrian news online Enab Baladi reported on May 3.

 

As per 1987 Protocol on Economic Cooperation between Syrian and Turkey, the annual 16 billion cubic meters of Euphrates River (500 m3/s) should to be released at the Syrian-Turkish border for five years. In 1990, Syria and Iraq signed an accord per which 42% and 58% were allocated to both countries, respectively.

 

Tigris and Euphrates Rivers are Drying Up

NASA studies recently have indicated that the Fertile Crescent region in the Middle East is losing fresh water at a rapid rate.  The water flow in the important Euphrates and Tigris Rivers has decreased as a result of this trend and formerly arable land in the area has become cracked and dry.  The Tigris and Euphrates Rivers are drying up, and these are the very rivers that were once a critical part of the Cradle of Civilization in ancient Mesopotamia 2000 years before Christ.  The decrease in water primarily has resulted from a major drought in 2007 and the loss of snow pack in the mountains to the north.  The image map from NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center and the National Center for Atmospheric Research shows the vast decrease in fresh water in 2008, which continues today.  This loss has occurred over the last decade and amounts to over 144 cubic kilometers of water lost from these ancient river basins, which include vast areas in Turkey, Syria, Iraq, and Iran.

The Euphrates River is mentioned in the Bible in the Book of Revelation in a prophecy that is predicted to occur just before Jesus returns.  During the Great Tribulation when the global destruction of the last days is threatening the very existence of life on Earth, the Apostle John says:

“And the sixth angel poured out his vial upon the great river Euphrates; and the water thereof was dried up, that the way of the kings of the east might be prepared.”

Rev. 16:12