The Kwilu River (
Portuguese: ''Rio Cuílo'';
French: ''Rivière Kwilu'';
Dutch: ''Kwilu Rivier'') is a major river in both
Lunda Norte Province and
Lunda Sul Province in
Angola
Angola, officially the Republic of Angola, is a country on the west-Central Africa, central coast of Southern Africa. It is the second-largest Portuguese-speaking world, Portuguese-speaking (Lusophone) country in both total area and List of c ...
as well as
Kwilu Province, formerly known as Bandundu province, in the
Democratic Republic of the Congo
The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), also known as the DR Congo, Congo-Kinshasa, or simply the Congo (the last ambiguously also referring to the neighbouring Republic of the Congo), is a country in Central Africa. By land area, it is t ...
(DRC) to the city of
Bandundu, where it joins the
Kwango River just before this stream enters the
Kasai River. In the DRC the river flows past the towns of
Gungu,
Kikwit,
Bulungu,
Bagata, Rutherfordia and Bandundu.
Lusanga, formerly Leverville, lies at the location where the
Kwenge River joins the Kwilu, between Kikwit and Bulungu.
Characteristics
It is a
meander
A meander is one of a series of regular sinuous curves in the Channel (geography), channel of a river or other watercourse. It is produced as a watercourse erosion, erodes the sediments of an outer, concave bank (cut bank, cut bank or river cl ...
ing river. Near its mouth it is 950 meters wide. The
bed material is
sand
Sand is a granular material composed of finely divided mineral particles. Sand has various compositions but is usually defined by its grain size. Sand grains are smaller than gravel and coarser than silt. Sand can also refer to a textural ...
.
The river is about long. In the wet season the flooded area covers .
The headwaters of the river rise at elevations between and in the Angolan highlands. They drop steeply to the flat central
Congo Basin at between and above sea level. A 2011 survey found 113 species of fish in 21 families and eight orders.
File:Au bord de la rivère Kwilu à Bandundu.jpg, Beside the river at Bandundu, June 2007
File:Rivière Kwilu à Bandundu.jpg, The river at Bandundu, June 2007
References
Sources
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Rivers of Angola
Rivers of the Democratic Republic of the Congo
International rivers of Africa
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