Negro River (Chaco)
Encyclopedia
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Spanish language
Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...
, Río Negro) in Chaco Province
Chaco Province
Chaco is an Argentine province located in the north of the country, near the border with Paraguay. Its capital is Resistencia on the Paraná River opposite the city of Corrientes...
, Argentina
Argentina
Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...
. It crosses the Chaco National Park
Chaco National Park
The Chaco National Park is a national park of Argentina, located in the province of Chaco. It has an area of 150 km². It was created in 1954 in order to protect a sample of the Eastern Chaco, composed mainly of warm lowlands, with an annual summer rainfall between 750 and 1,300 mm.This park is a...
and flows southeast. Near its mouth it flows by the cities of Puerto Tirol
Puerto Tirol
Puerto Tirol is a town in Chaco Province, Argentina. It is the head town of the Libertad Department.The town was founded on August 6, 1888....
, Resistencia
Resistencia, Chaco
Resistencia is the capital and largest city in the province of Chaco, in northeastern Argentina. At the 2001 census, the population of the Resistencia city proper was 274,490 inhabitants. It is the anchor of a slightly larger metropolitan area, Greater Resistencia, which comprises three more...
, and Barranqueras
Barranqueras
Barranqueras is a city in the southeast of the province of Chaco, Argentina, on a small tributary river on the right-hand-side shore of the Paraná River, only 7 km from the provincial capital Resistencia and within its metropolitan area...
, where it finally reaches Barranqueras River, arm of the Paraná River
Paraná River
The Paraná River is a river in south Central South America, running through Brazil, Paraguay and Argentina for some . It is second in length only to the Amazon River among South American rivers. The name Paraná is an abbreviation of the phrase "para rehe onáva", which comes from the Tupi language...
.
The river has changed it flatlands course several times along the years, leaving wetland
Wetland
A wetland is an area of land whose soil is saturated with water either permanently or seasonally. Wetlands are categorised by their characteristic vegetation, which is adapted to these unique soil conditions....
s, meander
Meander
A meander in general is a bend in a sinuous watercourse. A meander is formed when the moving water in a stream erodes the outer banks and widens its valley. A stream of any volume may assume a meandering course, alternately eroding sediments from the outside of a bend and depositing them on the...
s and lagoons. This took place because of three different factors; frequent draughts, sediments accumulation and human-made deviations of the riverbed. Sections of the river are currently contaminated by industrial waste, mainly from the leather tanning industry.
The Río Negro has historical importance to Resistencia, capital of Chaco Province, since most immigrants that populated Chaco arrived to the city in boats that drove up-river; on February 2 every year, the Festival of the Canoes and Boats is celebrated, remembering the day of the arrival of the first vapour that brought Friulian
Venice
Venice is a city in northern Italy which is renowned for the beauty of its setting, its architecture and its artworks. It is the capital of the Veneto region...
pioneers to the province.
The river is also used for sports such as rowing
Sport rowing
Rowing is a sport in which athletes race against each other on rivers, on lakes or on the ocean, depending upon the type of race and the discipline. The boats are propelled by the reaction forces on the oar blades as they are pushed against the water...
, and its importance as a means for commercial transport, once the main connection with the rest of the province, has since been eclipsed by road and rail transport. The river's propensity to floods has been controlled significantly by the construction of a dam near Resistencia.