Water destroying all life

Water is everywhere on the Earth, in the atmosphere, deep inside the ground and, of course, in all seas and oceans. It is not possible for animals and plants to live without it. A man can survive only about one week without drinking, some animals are accommodated to stay over one month without water, also there are special plants, cactuses and succulents, which are able to live without water for a couple of months. But after this time they are all dying because of a thirst or just wither. So no water means exactly no life. But what happens when there is too much water?

Water is more dangerous than many people may imagine. And I am not talking now about all those people who got drowned and all those ships that sank, because those accidents are mainly caused by a human mistake or simply - stupidity. Every year thousands of innocent people loose their lives, belongings and livestock in floods.

Flooding can be caused either by a storm (tidal) surge or the intensive rainfall. In both cases it means a tragedy and destruction. But sometimes river flooding is the only way to keep all the plants, animals and people living close to a river valley alive. Probably the best example is the Nile River, which is flooding every year and its mud is the best natural fertiliser for fields. Unfortunately, flooding brings generally more destruction than usefulness.

As it was written before, two main causes of floods are the storm surge and the rainfalls. Also every spring, when a snow is melting in mountains and much more water and an ice float is drifting in the rivers, a threat of flooding is very high, especially when a group of floes dams up the flow of water. A water level becomes higher and higher and, eventually, all the surrounding fields, villages or towns get flooded. The fields under the water are not a problem on rice plantations, for example in China, but in many regions of the world this means a disaster.

The intensive rainfalls in summer may become a nightmare for farmers. Fruits and vegetables decaying on shrubs, wet corn that cannot be reap. But it all means nothing comparing with the disaster that may be caused by flood. Many rivers, even in an economically more developed countries, are not flood-controlled. So every bigger rise of the water level is dangerous. Even one day of very intensive rainfalls causes the small rivers to burst their banks. Such local floods happen very often and usually there are no victims among people. But all the economic looses may be important - devastated crops and fields, dilapidated buildings, destroyed machines, cars, roads, bridges, tracks. Lots of plants and animals killed.

The problem is when it is raining for a week or ten days. A great amount of water from streams and smaller rivers reaches, flooding everything on its way, the big river causing rising of the water level. Thousands of tonnes of water are flowing very fast trying to find the way out from the too narrow and shallow valley. And when they eventually find it - they destroy everything on their way. Ruin buildings, kill people and animals, and destroy roads and bridges. After a couple of hours the water can ruin a city or a group of villages with the fields surrounding them. And there is no way to stop this destruction.