THE VICTORIA FALLS
THE Victoria Falls have been described as the largest curtain of fall in water known anywhere in the world at a point where the mighty Zambezi River with little advance warning plunges into a vast chasm stretching to nearly 2 kilometres across.
This is the sight that greets visitors between the months of March to May, the peak period for the headlong over the ledge down into a chasm 100 metres below.
During this period more than 5 million litres of water surge over the falls every second. The impact of so much falling water raises clouds of vapour that can be seen, on a good day, more than 30 kilometres away.
However, in the last few years, anyone who has seen pictures of the Falls, would be sorely disappointed, if they came to see the Falls between the months of July and January, because during this period there is no Falls to write home about.
During these months there is only a spectacle of jagged rocks for the visitor to behold. Many people fell cheated because they think we shall always have the falls.
The lack of water going over the falls is becoming a widespread complaint and it is pointed out that while the Zambian side is dry, the Zimbabwean side of the falls continues to thrill visitors who now go there in masses at our expense.
It has been suggested that, the blame for this state the affairs lies squarely on the Victoria Falls hydroelectric power station which provides electricity to the towns of Livingstone, Kalomo and Choma, and also exported to neighboring countries.
Water to drive the turbines is diverted into a channel further upstream, just below the Rainbow Lodge leaving the river dry at certain times of the year.
And it is this draw-off from the river that is blamed for the lack of water over the Eastern Cataract, with some people emotionally calling for the power station to be shut down completely or less dramatically, for the canal to be closed when there is no water going over the Eastern Cataract, as is usually done when dignitaries are visiting the falls.
The problem of the lack of water over the Falls cannot only be attributed to Zambian Electricity Supply Corporation as the culpable institution, but also to natural forces as well which are at play affecting the Eastern Cataract and contributing to its dryness.
One factor at work is that the cataract on the Zambian side is the highest of all and is therefore the most susceptible to fluctuations in levels during periods of drought as we have been experiencing in the past few years, hence the Eastern Cataract has been drier than most people can remember in past years.
A major factor, perhaps, is the geological structure of the falls area, which has been moving backwards over hundreds of years. The movement Northwards is still going on, and it is likely that the next gorge will fall on the Zimbabwean side, where as of today, Devil's Cataract is already much lower than the others.
In order to see how nature works, one has only to look at the gorges downstream of the Victoria Falls, which follow a zigzag course for some eight kilometres. The form is attributed to the repeated cutting back of the line of the falls and the consecutive formation and abandonment of each of seven broad waterfalls, which are said to have been comparable to the present one.
It has been possible to correlate the process of the formation of the falls with archaeological succession and to demonstrate the positions of the falls at various phases of the prehistoric past some thirty thousand years ago.
And since then, there has been no fewer than seven separate and distinct lines of the falls. In years to come, it is very likely that the Victoria falls the we see today will be no more and a new waterfall will form a distance upstream.
The present fall line is level right across from the Eastern Cataract to Cataract Island and is at a stage when it is possible to see where it may give way. Devil's Cataract has already given way and is several metres lower than any other point. The process is very slow when judged by the span of human life and there is no change that is discernable since accurate records were kept.
Yet the change is going on, time alone will tell and show, many generations later, but not in our time. The study of the present behaviour of the falls has given clues to its past course and from this we can guess its likely future course.
We are lucky today to be living at a time when Falls is more or less intact, and we can see the full width of the splendour of the seven natural wonders of the world.
also see bungi jumpingBack to Major
attractions of Zambia
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