The Augrabies Falls is a

waterfall A waterfall is a point in a river or stream where water flows over a vertical drop or a series of steep drops. Waterfalls also occur where meltwater drops over the edge of a tabular iceberg or ice shelf. Waterfalls can be formed in severa ...

on the

Orange River The Orange River (from Afrikaans/Dutch: ''Oranjerivier'') is a river in Southern Africa. It is the longest river in South Africa. With a total length of , the Orange River Basin extends from Lesotho into South Africa and Namibia to the north ...

, the largest river in

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the Atlantic Ocean, South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the ...

. Since 1966 the waterfall, set in a desolate and rugged milieu, is enclosed by the Augrabies Falls National Park. The falls are around in height. Some sources cite an approximate height of 480 feet; this is actually the height from the base of the canyon to the top of the walls, not that of the falls themselves.

Exploration

The original

Khoikhoi Khoekhoen (singular Khoekhoe) (or Khoikhoi in the former orthography; formerly also '' Hottentots''"Hottentot, n. and adj." ''OED Online'', Oxford University Press, March 2018, www.oed.com/view/Entry/88829. Accessed 13 May 2018. Citing G. S. ...

residents named the waterfall "Ankoerebis" — "place of great noise" — from which the Trek Boers, who settled here later on, derived the name, "Augrabies". The last leader of area's native residents was Klaas Pofadder who lived on an island upstream of the falls, now known as Klaas Island. The first westerner to see the falls was the renegade Swedish mercenary

Hendrik Jakob Wikar Henrik Jakob Wikar or ''Hendrik Jakob Wikar'' (born 28 October 1752 Kokkola, Finland (at that time Sweden)) was a Finnish explorer who travelled in Southern Africa and wrote his journal describing the life of the Khoisan people. Wikar's father w ...

. He arrived at the falls in October 1778, after years long wanderings in the wilderness. When another traveler, George Thompson, was led to the falls by his Koranna guides in 1826, he named it after King George IV.

Size

The Augrabies Falls have recorded of water every second in floods in 1988 (and in the floods of 2006). This is over three times the average high season flow rate of

Niagara Falls Niagara Falls () is a group of three waterfalls at the southern end of Niagara Gorge, spanning the border between the province of Ontario in Canada and the state of New York in the United States. The largest of the three is Horseshoe Fall ...

of per second, more than four times Niagara's annual average, and greater than Niagara's all-time record of per second. The gorge at the Augrabies Falls is deep and long, and is an impressive example of granite erosion.

Dangers

Since 1966, more than 20 people have fallen to their death in the gorge, and five have been swept over the falls. A Scandinavian tourist however survived a fall into the gorge in 1979, as did a man who was swept over the falls in October 1981. The bodies of others were trapped in the plunge pool below and never found. Similarly, animals including cattle and hippopotamuses have been swept over the falls. File:Augrabies Falls 1.JPG , The waterfall from the viewing platform Image:Augrabies Falls.jpg , Augrabies Falls during the winter File:Augrabie 01.jpg , The waterfall in flood

Folklore

Folklore among early twentieth-century South African prospectors describes the pool beneath the King George Cataract as being filled with diamonds, which are carried by currents down the Orange River. Additionally, the pool is also claimed to be the lair of a serpentine monster called the

Grootslang The Grootslang or Grote Slang (Afrikaans and Dutch for "big snake") is a legendary creature that is reputed to dwell in a deep cave in the Richtersveld, South Africa. Legend The Grootslang is said to be a huge elephant-sized serpent that dwells ...

References

External links