Longest Rivers on Earth
The 5 longest rivers on Earth are the Nile, the Amazon, the Yangtze, the Missouri and the Yenisei Rivers, respectively.
Of the most famous, Africa’s Nile River is also the longest, totaling an amazing 6,650 kilometers. The major tributaries are the Blue Nile and the White Nile; the river eventually flows into the Mediterranean Sea. Both tributaries are to the west of the Great Rift Valley; at one time, another tributary, Albert Nile, was fed by Lake Tanganyika, the world’s second deepest lake. However, the additional 900 meters of length was lost to volcanic activity.
The Amazon River in South America runs 6,400 kilometers, a close second to the Nile; however, by volume it is rightly the world’s largest river. The River has over 1,000 tributaries and releases enormous quantities of fresh water into the Atlantic ocean; at a rate that reaches 300,000 m3 / second, the Amazon provides 1/5 of the freshwater entering the worlds’ oceans.
In China, the Yangtze River runs its course over 6,300 kilometers, ending in the East China Sea. Thousands of lakes feed the river, the largest being Lake Poyang, but the largest tributary is the Han River. This river has become famous in recent years due to the devastating extinction of the Yangtze dolphin, and the near extinction of the Finless Porpoise, not to mention heavy pollution and detrimental damming of the River.
The longest river in North America, the Missouri River, is part of the river system that ranks forth in the world’s longest rivers. Including the Jefferson, the Missouri and the Mississippi Rivers, the system totals 6,300 kilometers, beginning in Brower’s Spring, Montana, and emptying into the Gulf of Mexico.
Finally, the Yenesei River of Russia runs a length of 5,539 kilometers into the Kara Sea, north of Siberia and part of the Arctic Ocean. Vast portions of the river are tapped to fuel Russia’s hydroelectric efforts, and other areas are severely damaged by the industrial history of the area. Regardless, the Yenesie River has a claim to fame in that it helps to drain the world’s deepest lake, Lake Baikal, via the tributary Angara River.
The rivers of Earth are impressive in their great lengths and volumes. We have considered the 5 longest river systems of the world, which, put together total more than 31,000 kilometers, more than 10 times the distance from the West to East coasts of the USA. Needless to say, that is a lot of river.
