For years, scientists have warned that deforestation was pushing the Amazon toward the moment when it can no longer maintain its own ecology — the tipping point.
In some parts of the forest, the collapse is already underway. wapo.st/3Ei7SpH
Conversation
Replying to
In the remote city of Rio Branco in Brazil’s Acre state, a desperate wait for water is only just beginning.
In an interview with The Post, Antonia Franco dos Santos explains what it's like to live in a landscape she never imagined: an Amazon gone dry. wapo.st/3Ei7SpH
0:34
4.9K views
2
24
47
The Amazon is an ecosystem bound together by wind and rain. Trees drink up rainfall and release it back into the atmosphere in a process known as evapotranspiration.
During the dry season, the forest is particularly dependent on itself.
4
26
55
But deforestation corrodes the system. Fewer trees mean less evapotranspiration. Less rain. And less moisture carried into the forest.
A drier forest is more vulnerable to fire and drought. Plant species better suited to drier conditions grow dominant. wapo.st/3Ei7SpH
0:18
102.8K views
4
23
35
Scientists fear the climate has already changed in Rio Branco.
Every rainy season seems to bring floods.
And nearly every dry season ushers in a drought, when a growing number of people are forced to choose between dirty water or none at all.
4
10
32
The impact on health is apparent.
Acre state was struck by an outbreak of acute diarrhea last year that killed two children.
Smoke from rampant forest fires has so polluted Rio Branco’s air that dozens of people are hospitalized every dry season. wapo.st/3Ei7SpH
read image description
ALT
read image description
ALT
3
11
31
The community is taking extraordinary steps to survive.
Each morning, a fleet of tank trucks bearing water is dispatched to schools, hospitals, the prison, and a swelling number of impoverished communities not connected to municipal water lines. wapo.st/3Ei7SpH
read image description
ALT
read image description
ALT
read image description
ALT
read image description
ALT
2
9
27
The city is dependent on drivers such as Freddy Salles, who wake up at dawn to pump up fresh water from an underground aquifer that, for now, still runs deep and cool.
When Salles grew up, the forest was lush. He never dreamed it would dry up. wapo.st/3Ei7SpH
0:12
5.2K views
3
9
23
Water delivery is the best part of Franco’s week.
In the absence of water, dirty dishes and clothes pile up quickly in her shack.
She lives with her infant great-grandson, Samuel. She worries about diarrhea, dehydration or worse. wapo.st/3Ei7SpH
read image description
ALT
read image description
ALT
read image description
ALT
read image description
ALT
2
4
15
Franco yells with glee as Salles’s 2,600-gallon truck arrives. She is the seventh of the eight households in line.
When it’s her turn, she places a hose into her water drum and takes a step back.
The water comes out in a trickle.
“It’s weak,” she says. wapo.st/3Ei7SpH
read image description
ALT
4
8
26
About 18 percent of the rainforest is now gone, and the evidence increasingly supports the warnings.
Whether or not the tipping point has arrived — and some scientists think it has — the Amazon is beginning to collapse.
8
56
84