Ecuador's biggest waterfall has disappeared

[Bill Ryan]

From https://cuencahighlife.com/countrys-...nder-river-bed

Ecuador’s largest waterfall stops flowing after sink hole opens under river bed



Ecuador’s most iconic waterfall is gone forever, geologists say.

The 150-meter high Cascada San Rafael in the Cayambe Coca National Park went from a torrent to a trickle Sunday after a massive sinkhole swallowed the Coca River behind it. The collapse formed three smaller waterfalls that are not visible from the viewing stations around the original falls.

Ecuador’s Emergency Operations office and Environmental Ministry are forbidding entry into the area around San Rafael, saying that further collapses of rock formations are possible. “We don’t yet understand the process that is occurring at San Rafael except that there has been a deformation that has diverted the flow of the river,” a spokesman for the environmental ministry said Wednesday. “A research team will be in the area on Friday and we will know more then.”

In addition to the collapse of the riverbed behind San Rafael, large rock formations fell into the basin below the original falls on Sunday.

Most of what is known about the collapse so far comes from drone overflights, which show the river falling into a large crevasse behind San Rafael. According to video observations, it is believed that the river flows underground before returning to its original channel downstream.

The Tourism Ministry has told tour guides that all visits to the falls must be cancelled until further notice. In response to suggestions by several tour companies that the government reconstruct the riverbed to restore San Rafael, a spokeswoman said that that is not possible. “Unfortunately, Cascada San Rafael is now part of history and will not return. We will inform agencies and guides if new arrangements can be made to view the new cascades but this will take some time.”

An estimated 30,000 tourists visited San Rafael in 2019.

The San Rafael waterfall is located in the transition zone between the Andes mountains and the Amazon basin, on the border of Napo and Sucumbíos provinces. The area is part of the Sumaco Biosphere Reserve that includes some of Ecuador’s greatest flora and fauna diversity. Biologists will be on the team that visit the area Friday.

[Rawhide68]

I thought waterfalls lasted forever, kind of sad news

[Kryztian]

Unfortunately, the laws of gravity and geology don't really care much about human admiration.

On May 3rd, 2003, the official symbol of New Hampshire, the Old Man of the Mountain, collapsed. His profile is on the state seal, on the state license plate, on state route signs.

A composite image of the Old Man of the Mountain
created from images taken before and after the collapse.

Apparently the water and the rock at both these locations didn't have very much concern for their human admirers and just decided to go ahead and do what time and the laws of physics dictated that there were destined to do.

Both locations are still natural sites - are they any less beautiful?

[Tam]

Human greed knows no bounds.

[Caliban]

Posted by Tam (here)
Human greed knows no bounds.

I don't think we can pin this on the two-leggeds this time, Tam.

[p+52]

https://translate.google.com/transla...losion-lluvias

VIDEO: The moment when an implosion leaves the highest waterfall in Ecuador almost without water

https://twitter.com/i/status/1224649593700470784

[Kryztian]

Posted by Caliban (here)

Posted by Tam (here)
Human greed knows no bounds.

I don't think we can pin this on the two-leggeds this time, Tam.

Now we can! Specifically on Chinese two-leggeds. This might be related to the Chinese recently built Coca Coda dam, twenty miles upstream from the waterfall.

Emilio Cobo [coordinator of the South America Water Program at the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN)] hypothesises that the hydroelectric plant is indirectly related to the collapse of San Rafael.

The Coca Codo Sinclair plant is not located on the river, but the diversion reservoir itself has a system of sand traps that remove sediment so as not to affect its operation. 

“When a river loses sediments, water increases its erosive capacity, an effect called ‘hungry waters’,” says Cobo. “All rivers carry eroded sediments from the soils and rocks on which they pass. All dams and reservoirs trap part of this sediment, especially heavy materials, and thus deprive the downstream river of its normal sediment load.” 

Large reservoirs and dams will typically trap more than 90%, and sometimes 100%, of the incoming sediment, Cobo says.

The clear water under a dam is said to be ‘hungry’ and will seek to recover its sediment load by eroding the river bed and banks, Patrick McCully writes in his book Silenced Rivers: The Ecology and Politics of Large Dams.

--- from Why did Ecuador’s tallest waterfall suddenly disappear?


It seems everything about this dam has been a damn disaster. It was greatly delayed, over budget and 15 people died constructing it. Now it seems to be falling apart.

Ecuador seeks outside help to solve problems at the Coca Codo hydroelectric plant