Strangely, the driest desert in the world, cacti can't live: Home to more than 1 million people!

The earth on which we live is a world with many strange things. One of them is the driest desert in the world, where seemingly nothing can survive can feed up to 1 million locals. Which desert is that?

This desert is famously the driest in the world but can feed more than 1 million people.

Rainfall in millimeters

The desert we are talking about is the Atacama, it is a non-polar desert located in South America. The Atacama Desert is located in northern Chile and a small part in the south of Peru. It lies between the Andes and the Pacific Ocean, 960km south of the Tropic of Cancer. The Atacama Desert is different from other places by its unique terrain of rocky hills and volcanic rocks and stretches of sand dunes. This desert is located at an altitude of 3,200m above sea level and up to 181,300km2.

The Atacama is one of the most inhospitable regions on Earth. According to the analysis of scientists, from 1570 to 1971, the Atacama desert did not have much rain. Even some areas here have never seen a drop of rain. This has made the Atacama Desert an extremely arid region. But some other parts of the desert receive a lot of rain, creating diverse ecosystems.

There are areas in the Atacama Desert that get as little as 3mm of rainfall per year.

The average rainfall of the Atacama Desert can only be measured in millimeters. Parts of the desert such as Iquique and Arica receive only 3 mm of rainfall per year.

According to scientists, there are three main reasons for the scarcity of rain in the Atacama Desert.

1. First, the desert is blocked by the Andes and causes the Foehn effect. This is a climatic phenomenon that causes clouds to release so much rain on mountain slopes that there is no water left when they pass.
2. The second is due to the influence of the Humboldt Current, which transported cold water from Antarctica to the coasts of Chile and Peru, causing the sea breeze to cool down. At the same time, this flow also reduces the evaporation of water and makes it difficult for rain clouds to form.
3. Third, there is a very wide and high volcanic plain called the Altiplano. To the south of the Altiplano it removes moisture from the Pacific Ocean, and to the north it prevents storms from the Amazon region from entering Chile.

"Mars on Earth"

Scientists have discovered that the topography of the Atacama Desert is very similar to that of Mars. This desert is also used as a test site for NASA's Mars-sent instruments and robots. According to a study published in the journal Geology, the Atacama Desert was once the site of a comet impact that occurred about 12,000 years ago. The comet's explosion was so powerful that it created giant slabs of silicate glass that still exist today.

These glass fields are so wide, blue and black, they stretch up to 75km. When viewed up close, the shards of glass were twisted, folded, and tossed as they were molten. This only happens when there are large explosions, creating winds as strong as tornadoes.

The topography of the Atacama Desert has many similarities with Mars.

The glass in the Atacama Desert contains fragments of minerals commonly found in meteorites that have fallen to Earth. Specifically, these minerals are cubanite and troilite. The minerals in the glass resemble grains collected by NASA's Comet Wild 2 sampling mission. Scientists think the minerals in the Atacama Desert are the remains of a comet similar to Wild 2 after it exploded in the desert and melted the sand.

According to Professor Pete Schultz, the study's author, this is the first time they have evidence of glass on Earth made from heat and wind radiation from a fireball exploding just above the surface. face. Although volcanic activity can also produce this type of glass, they believe that the glass at Atacama was not formed this way.

A harsh place

Deserts are known for being extremely hot. But the Atacama Desert is much harsher. In addition to the absence of rain, the prolonged lack of water is also the reason why the Atacama desert is not a suitable place to live. Experts predict that the extremely dry environment here will exist for another 10-15 million years.

Experts predict that the dry environment in the Atacama Desert will exist for another 10-15 million years.

Even in the Atacama Desert, cacti could not grow. The air is too dry, and oxidation cannot take place in metal materials. If you put a piece of meat here, without any method of mummification, the meat will stay like that forever. Large areas of land are so barren and devoid of water vapor that even microscopic bacteria find it difficult to live here.

Although the Atacama desert has mountains up to 6,885 meters high, they do not have any snow or ice. During the ice age, snow and ice did not exist here. Summer here is also extremely harsh. Just imagine what it would be like for people to live in a place where the night temperature drops to minus 25 degrees Celsius and during the day it reaches 50 degrees Celsius. If you go to Atacama in the summer, you may experience consequences such as hair breakage. crumbs, cracked nails and feet.

The place that feeds 1 million people

The ancients still said that water is the source of life and that it is difficult for people to survive in places without water. But in the barren and severely water-deficient Atacama Desert, there are still more than 1 million residents living in coastal cities, fishing villages and oasis cities. According to local historical records, people have been here thousands of years ago. So how can those people survive in this harsh desert?

If you put a piece of meat in the Atacama desert without any mummification, it will stay that way forever.

In fact, after living in the Atacama Desert for a long time, locals have found a unique way to store water. They used dense nets to collect water from aquifers caused by melting snow in the Andes. After that, water will follow pipes to each household.

In addition, the Atacama desert is also one of the ideal places for mankind to observe the night sky. Because it has a high altitude and wide area, it is very convenient for stargazing. Every year there are more than 300 nights with very clear skies. Not only is there virtually no light pollution, but the low cloud cover and high altitude above sea level make the image seen through the telescope's optical tube very sharp. As a result, this desert is also home to one of the largest telescopes in the world.

The Atacama Desert is also an ideal place to observe the night sky.

The Atacama Desert also has eight hot pools with an average temperature of 33°C. These hot pools have a particularly green color and taste that is good for people to relax. All 8 of these hot pools are open to visitors. Between October and June is the best time to visit these hot springs.