Amazon River

The Amazon River (occasionally River Amazon; Spanish: Río Amazonas, Portuguese: Rio Amazonas) of South America is one of the two longest rivers on Earth, the other being the Nile in Africa. The Amazon has by far the greatest total flow of any river, carrying more than the Mississippi, Nile, and Yangtze rivers combined. Its drainage area, called the Amazon Basin, is the largest of any river system. The Amazon could be considered the "strongest" (largest volume of water per second).

Tidal bore

Following the coast, a little to the north of Cabo do Norte, and for 160 km (100 miles) along its Guiana margin up the Amazon, is a belt of half-submerged islands and shallow sandbanks. Here the tidal phenomenon called the bore, or Pororoca, occurs, where the depths are not over 4 fathoms (7 m). The tidal bore starts with a roar, constantly increasing, and advances at the rate of from 15 to 25 km/h (10 to 15 mph), with a breaking wall of water from 1.5 to 4 m (5 to 12 ft) high. The bore is the reason the Amazon does not have a delta; the ocean rapidly carries away the vast volume of silt carried by the Amazon, making it impossible for a delta to grow.

Related Topics:
Bore - Fathom - Delta - Silt

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