Padma River

Course of the Padma in the middle of Bangladesh

Horizon length Padma with fishing boats

The Padma ( Bengali: পদ্মা, Padma, " lotus flower ") is the nearly 120 -kilometer penultimate section of the largest by volume flowrate of Asia.

Course

As Padma is now especially the section with the confluence of the Ganges and the larger Brahmaputra ( called Jamuna in the lower section ) and ends at the mouth of further southeast in Chandpur, from left inflowing Upper Meghna. The current then leads to the last 130 kilometers to the mouth of the Bay of Bengal, the name Lower Meghna. Colloquially in Bangladesh but also called the lowest main branch of the Ganges, Padma, from about the previous (now replaced by a channel ) branching of the current flowing to the south Bhagirathi, which reached later than in the area of Hooghly Kolkata the Bay of Bengal. This Padma - Ganges has a natural (now reduced by human intervention ) average discharge of approximately 11,400 m³ / s He joins near Aricha and Shivalaya with the Jamuna, the main stream of the Brahmaputra in Bangladesh, whose average outflow is 20,100 m³ / s. The following actual Padma forms an almost straight riverbed 3-8 kilometers wide, the flat areas are often interspersed with sand banks, and its current channels can reach over 30 meters depth.

Flow history and nomenclature

After several large-scale flow relocations within this current system over the last 250 years, the Padma is now part of the main line Tsangpo - Brahmaputra - Jamuna - Padma - Lower Meghna, which lies between the mouth of points of the two largest tributaries, namely the coming of the right gear and the of left coming Meghna. However, in the 18th century the Padma was beside the Bhagirathi to the left of two equal- estuary of the Ganges, both of which led directly into the sea. A branch of the Jamuna today called Brahmaputra age, marks the former course of the Brahmaputra, which went so far to the east that the two rivers flowed almost separated from each other in the Bay of Bengal. This former situation is still reflected in the nomenclature, even if the main streams have been very different today. This explains the name of equality of very different sections of the river as the Brahmaputra, Meghna and Padma and also the name of diversity in the course of said main flow. The relocation of the aisle toward the Padma - arm and the Brahmaputra to the west, so also for Padma is the one explained by tectonic uplift in the western Ganges delta and the other as consequences of an earthquake in 1782 and floods in 1787, during which also the major tributary of the Tista shifted its course from the Ganges to the Brahmaputra.

Use

About 15 kilometers before the border crossing of the Ganges of India to Bangladesh at Shibganj ( Chapai Nababganj ) is built on the 1974 Farakka Dam, a large part of the water derived and submitted to the Bhagirathi - arm, with the result that in periods of drought, irrigated below in Bangladesh soils too salty and the navigation is impeded in the river. The derivation is mainly used for navigation on the Hooghly in the area of Kolkata.

The Ganges is here already called Padma Further below, spanned by the 1.8-kilometer Hardinge Bridge, which was built from 1910 to 1915.

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