The San Rafael is the tallest waterfall in Ecuador and now it has run dry.?The cause of the same has been traced to a mysterious sinkhole that opened underneath the river that fed the falls.
The falls are located in Cayambe Coca Park, part of the Ecuadorian Amazon near the border with Colombia, and were the tallest in the country at more than 500 feet.?
The government has meanwhile ¡®restricted access to the site of the falls and surrounding area as a team investigates what caused the sinkhole,' according to one?report.?Some think that a hydroelectric plant 12 miles upstream could be the cause.?
"A waterfall that has been there for thousands of years does not collapse, coincidentally, a few years after opening a hydroelectric project. These are processes that are in scientific papers and there is sufficient evidence that a dam can cause effects of this type on a river,"?Mongabay quoted Emilio Cobo, coordinator at the South America Water Program with the International Union for the Conservation of Nature as saying.?
The plant, was built by the Chinese company SinoHydro and it opened in 2016. It isn't directly on the river, ¡®but it has a diversion reservoir that's designed to remove between 90 and 100 per cent of the sediment from the river before its waters reach the plant.¡¯
The sediment is supposed to act as a protective layer in riverbeds. It helps insulate the ground below from water erosion.?If there is no steady flow of new sediment from upstream, the older sediment eventually gets washed away, which leaves the riverbed susceptible to erosion, researchers describe this as 'hungry waters.'
However, geologist and former secretary of Natural Capital at Ecuador's Ministry of Environment Alfredo Carrasco argues that seismic activity in the region could also be the cause of 'hungry waters' phenomenon.?
¡°There are many quite intense earthquakes here. In March 1987, a very strong one appeared that caused tremendous damage to the trans-Ecuadorian oil pipeline that passes right through it. For me, the phenomenon is eminently of natural origin,¡± Carrasco reportedly said.
No matter what the cause, researchers agree that the sinkhole will reshape the region as one river has now split into three smaller streams. This creates the added risk of landslides, and it could also potentially threaten the well-being of fish and other invertebrates part of the river's ecosystem.