Amazon

The Amazon River
The Amazon River is an amazing work of nature. The cultures that make the Amazon their home are were very well adapted before the Europeans came. The Amazon is being destroyed and people are blind to the damages they're doing. The Amazon effects more than just the people living near by, it effects the world.
The Amazon River is the second longest river in world. The headwaters begin high in the soaring Andes Mountains and stretches 6,400 km across the South American continent to the Atlantic Ocean. It discharges between 34 to 121 million liters of water per second, and depositing an average of 3 million tons of sediments near its mouth. The outpouring of water and residue is so vast that the salt content and the color of the Atlantic Ocean are altered for a distance of about 320km from the mouth of the river. Also, unlike many other rivers it's wide and straight from the headwaters to the mouth. During a new or full moon, a wave front from the ocean sweeps 650km upstream at speeds of 65km/h and this causes waves as high as 5m. Because of its vastness, annual floods, and navigability, the Amazon River is often called the Ocean River. The Amazon River is the largest and wettest tropical plain on Earth with heavy rains.
Europeans were not the original keepers of this vast rainforest. The Amazonians are trapped between the old and new customs, and since they have traditions, their technology is not as modern as the rest of the worlds. They live on the richest land with a wide variety of flora and fauna. With such great resources, including the river as transportation, almost anybody would want to seize the land and gain profits easily. The Amazonians have little power to defend themselves with spears against their guns. Unfortunately, the outside world has brought them diseases that are incurable with their own medicine. They cannot exist in the way they were before, but they know the Amazon better than any of us. If the rich businessmen... [continues]

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