FASCINATING STUDY

Evening Star, Issue 21992, 30 March 1935, Page 9

FASCINATING STUDY

WORLD’S WATERFALLS Forty thousand miles by ship, train, and aeroplane in the study of the world’s greatest waterfalls is the record of Mr Edward C. Kashleigh, the English traveller and' explorer, who is at present in South Africa after an extensive tour through North America and Europe. Falling water and roaring cataracts have exercised a life-long fascination for Mr Kashleigh, and for the last lew years ho has devoted all his time to their study. His journeys have taken him to little-known regions of the earth and ho has collected more information about the waterfalls of the world than probably any man alive. Mr Kashleigh will shortly visit the Victoria Falls and the out-of-the-way Orange River Falls in order to gather further data. In the meantime lie has read most of the available information about these two falls and is in a position to compare them with other great falls he has visited.

“ The most impressive waterfall 1 have over seen ” he told a representative of the ‘Cape Times.’ “is undoubtedly the Niagara Falls. I am, in a way, surprised that the Victoria Falls have not received the same publicity as Niagara, in view of the claims which have been made for them. “ Bear in mind that in one season alone tourists and visitors have spent £5,000,000, including transport, at Niagara Falls. This is not an exaggeration, but the actual figure supplied by the Publicity Department, which caters for Niagara Falls. “ I am curious to know what the average number of visitors is to the Zambesi. Some people say that the Victoria Falls are the greatest in the world, and I have frequently been asked if this is so. But it is a difficult question to answer, because, with the exception of Niagara, all falls vary so much in their volume of water. Niagara, for instance, is influenced by wind blowing against the water. “ The mean fall of water at Niagara,” continued Mr Kashleigh, “ is 212,200 cubic feet per second over the period 1860-1907, before the water began to be diverted seriously. The mean volume at the Victoria Falls, according to the report published by Dr du Toit in 1925, is only 38,430 cubic feet per second. DECLINE IN VOLUME. “ But at low water the volume at the Victoria Falls declines to 8,000 cubic feet, which,” said Mr Kashleigh, “ was not much more'than an average Thames flood. “ An extreme Thames flood will run to something like 20,000_ cubic feet per second. In 1919, according to the late Professor Schworz, the water was so low at the Victoria Falls that one could almost walk across Horn at the top. The average flood volume of the Victoria Falls, between 1908 and 1925, was 82,000 cubic feet per Second; but even that figure is only about two-fifths of flic mean flood volume!of the Niagara. “ During the period 1908 and 1925, the flood flow at thd Victoria Falla varied from 45,000 cubic feet to 140,000 cubic foot, but only ia four of those

years did it ever exceed the 100,000 cubic feet mark.” Mr Kashleigh spoke of the Iquazu Falls in South America. These falls are on tho Iquazu River, which is 820 miles long and flows into the Alto Parana, the great feeder of the Rio do la Plata, which flows out at Buenos Aires. “ The falls,” he said, “ occur twelve miles up stream from the point where the Iquazu River joins the Parana. Including a great number of islands and many deep indentations on the crest line, they are over 4,oooyds in width.' in extreme flood volume the Iquazu may attain to over 450,000 cubic feet per second. The greatest drop at normal flow is 237 ft. I say ‘ normal flow ’ because the height varies immensely with the volume of the river. At dead low water the Iquazu will sink, like the Victoria Falls, to something like 8,000 cubic feet per second. “ The greatest drop at low water will be 270 ft, but during the flood season the rise of the water is so great in the narrow gorge below the falls, where the water piles up and is unable to escape quickly enough, that the, rise of the water in the gorge may bo from 100 ft to 120 ft. This, of course, decreases tho drop of the falls by that amount.” _ Tho main volume of the Iquazu Falls, as compared with the Niagara and the Victoria Falls, is 61,660 cubic feet per second, and the average flood volume is not far short of 170,000 cubic feet. The greater volume of the Iquazu, as compared with the Victoria Falls, is accounted for by the fact that the rainfall of the Iquazu basin is incomparably greater than that in , the Upper Zambesi. The Zambesi average rainfall is about 30in.

At the source of the Iquazu, where it rises almost within sight of the Atlantic, in the high sierras, the average rainfall is 157 in, and throughout the whole of the heavily afforestated basin the average is 79in. “ But the greatest falls, as far as tho volume of water is concerned,” went on Mr Rashleigh, “ are the Guay, a Falls, which occur on the Parana River itself, at a point 125 miles above where the Iquaza flows into it. The total drop here, over a distance of thirty miles, is 373 ft, the highest falls themselves having a vertical drop of about 130 ft.

“ The volume at Guayra, even at its lowest stage, is nearly double that of Niagara, being about 406,000 cubic feet per second; the mean annual flow is about 475,000 cubic feet, and the extreme flood flow has been known, in certain years such as 1905 and 1929, to be not far short of 1,800,000 cubic feet, an amount equivalent to eight and a-half normal Niagaras. “ It has been calculated by Mr J. B. Groff, who Wrote an account of this fall in an Italian journa l that if it were possible’ to divert tho whole of the water at Guayra Falls during the period of maximum flood,and to utilise the total drop of 373 ft, something like 174,000,000 horse-power would be available.” Another waterfall which Mr Rashleigb considers should be grouped with the world’s greatest fails is that of Paulo Affonso, which occurs on the Rio Sno Francisco, in North-eastern Brazil. These falls have a total drop, including the upper rapids, of about 275 ft. the lowest and main fall having a sheer drop of 192 ft.

The rapids there arc the most siup-

endous and awe-inspiring in the world, he considers. The first good account of these falls was by the famous explorer, Sir Richard Burton, in his book, ' The Highlands of the Brazil,’ published in 1866, and since then information about them has been extremely scanty.