Yellow Rivers Flooding History Essay

Yellow River's Flooding History

Flooding is the most common hydrological hazard occurring in various regions of the world. For instance, statistics have recorded 3000 such disasters since the beginning of the 20th century. This is attributed to the widespread distribution of rivers, floodplains, and low-lying coastal plains that are extremely attractive for human settlement. Occurrence of this hazard claims approximately twenty thousand lives each year: at least twenty million are displaced across the globe from their homes at the same time. In addition to devastating impacts on humanity, floods are also known to impact negatively on the economy especially for those countries that have invested heavily on disaster management technology (Keith 232). This study focuses on the flooding history of the lower Yellow River, which is a key water body that has served Chinese civilization for ages. The main factors considered are the driving forces of flood frequency, the implication of flooding on the Chinese society throughout its imperial period, and the manner in which human factors have contributed to the frequency of flooding events in the later imperial period.

It is clear from the article that flooding occurs due to the super-elevation of the river belt caused by sediment accumulation in the channel and the increment in the water supply. In the case study of Yellow River, water and sediment contributed by the middle section of the river account for about fifty percent and eighty-eight percent respectively of the water discharge experienced at the entrance of the lower river.Much of the rain is attributed to the East Asia Monsoon winds that influence the extent of storms and precipitation experienced in this region. Sediments and ninety percent of loess are eroded into the middle section of the river gets transported to the lower section. Consequently, the riverbed is elevated significantly causing the river to burst its levees and flood the surrounding region.

Human activities in the upper and middle sections of Yellow river are another factor that contributes immensely to the high rate of flooding at the lower section. For instance, the middle Yellow River basin drains the forest-steppe ecotone making it suitable for farming and grazing. As the climate changed, most of the Chinese nomadic people relocated to this region to enjoy the benefits of the river. The migration and relocation caused the area under farmland to be expansive. Because of the intensive farming, soil erosion and sedimentation rate in the lower channel increased substantially thus raising the riverbed. In fact, this river has been previously described to be having sixty-percent silt (Chen 684).

Historically, the establishment of dynasties that settled in the region who converted to both settlement and farming scheme characterized the banks of the Yellow River. The massive felling trees for firewood and construction of palaces led to considerable deforestation. The Sanyangzhuang settlement site….....