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Peru River Research Paper

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This article certainly caught my eye. Can you imagine that in the deepest jungle in the Peruvian Amazon there is a percolating, roiling, boiling river? The waters in this river can reach a temperature of up to 200 degrees Fahrenheit and all around it is lush vegetation and forest. The locals living here believed that the river is sacred and that these particularly hot water had healing powers and shamans used it along with their medicine. Andre Ruzo a geothermal scientist and National Geographic Young Explorer has explored this river called Shanay-timpishka. He recalls that when he was just a child his Peruvian grandfather told him about this river. The name of the river loosely translated means “boiling with the heat of the sun”. The headwaters are marked with a boulder which looks like the head of a …show more content…

Then as he was creating a thermal map of Peru for his graduate studies at Southern Methodist University in Texas he came upon an unusually large hot spot which appeared to be one of the largest geothermal features to be found on any continent. He went on an expedition with his aunt to central Peru in November 2011. From the nearest city Pucallupa their journey took around four hours which included a two-hour drive, a 45-minute motorized canoe ride and an hour hike along muddy jungle paths. The shaman of the small town of Mayantuyacu, a secluded healing center protects the boiling river. It was arranged that his apprentice took Ruzo the four-mile stretch to the flowing, scalding water. The temperature in the river ranges from 120 degrees to almost 200 degrees Fahrenheit and can be up to 16 feet deep in certain places. The mud upon the riverbank which should usually be cool to walk upon was too hot to walk barefoot. If a person fell into the river he or she would be covered in third-degree burns in less than a second. Unfortunate animals such as frogs can be found floating dead and cooked

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