SpatialNews Press Release
Precise Source Of Amazon River In Peru Is Pinpointed By Advanced Technology
WASHINGTON—A five-nation team on a National Geographic
Society expedition in Peru has determined the source of the
Amazon River using advanced navigation technology.
The team, led by Andrew Pietowski, a math teacher in Carmel,
N.Y., used advanced Global Positioning System (GPS) equipment
to make measurements that precisely confirmed the ultimate source
of the river as a stream beginning on Nevado Mismi, an
18,363-foot-high mountain in southern Peru. Mismi was identified
as the source of the Amazon in a 1971 National Geographic
expedition, but in recent years at least one other stream, flowing
from a separate peak, has been in contention as the Amazon’s
ultimate source.
The GPS equipment used by the expedition is considered accurate
to within 1 to 5 meters; this is the first time such high-precision
equipment is known to have been used in this remote area.
“I was delighted to lead the team of explorers and scientists, despite
what we had to overcome—cold, vicious winds and temperatures
well below zero Fahrenheit, high altitude, and very rough terrain,”
said Pietowski. “The trip’s result is a highly reliable map of the
Amazon’s headwaters and an accurate determination of the river’s
source.”
Pietowski, originally from Poland, and his team of 22 people
representing the United States, Poland, Peru, Canada and Spain,
made the expedition in July 2000. They traveled by foot, Jeep,
bicycle and horseback to explore the five remote Andean rivers that
combine to form the Amazon—the Apurimac, Huallaga, Mantaro,
Maranion and Urubamba-Vilcanota. The Apurimac is considered
the most distant from the Amazon’s mouth.
The GPS work was directed by geographer Andrew Johnston of
the Smithsonian Institution’s National Air and Space Museum in
Washington. “The ‘source’ of the Amazon can be defined as the
most distant point in the drainage basin from which surface water
runs year- round, or the furthest point from which water could
possibly flow to the Atlantic,” Johnston said. “Nevado Mismi fits
both of these definitions.” The mapping effort found another stream
to be slightly longer than that flowing from Mismi, but it was
discounted as the source because it does not flow year-round in its
upper reaches.
The expedition, supported by the National Geographic Society’s
Expeditions Council, gathered GPS data daily from a base station at
15,500 feet, near the confluence of several tributaries of the
Apurimac River. Mobile teams used GPS equipment to map the
area’s drainage features and the path of the Continental Divide,
which defines the boundary of the Amazon River drainage basin.
The expedition was the culmination of four reconnaissance trips in
1998 and 1999 that gathered preliminary data and organized field
logistics. The trips were led by Ned Strong of Lexington, Mass.,
Pietowski and Johnston. Team member Piotr Chmielinski, originally
of Poland, had led a 1991 expedition through Peru’s Colca
Canyon, near the Amazon’s source, and was the first person to
navigate the entire length of the Amazon.
The Amazon springs from the Andes’ high glacial regions, and the
riddle about its source has inspired speculation for centuries; Jesuit
Cristoval de Acuna wrote about his theory on the Amazon’s source
to the king of Spain back in 1641. The National Geographic
expedition in 1971, led by explorer/journalist Loren McIntyre,
pinpointed Mismi as the source of the Amazon, and National
Geographic maps published since then have reflected that
conclusion.
The Amazon may be the world’s longest river, though some believe
its length is exceeded by the Nile’s. Without question the Amazon,
with its sprawling web of tributaries, carries more water than the
Nile—its volume is 60 times greater.
Contact:
Barbara Moffet
+1 202 857-7756
bmoffet@ngs.org
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