Talk:Lake Victoria
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[edit] Useful picture
.jpg/300px-Lake_Victoria_(NASA).jpg)
I uploaded a cropped NASA satellite picture of Lake Victoria; it may be useful despite the few clouds hanging over it. I don't have enough time to find a nice place for it in the article so I'm parking it here. — mark ✎ 14:01, 11 Jan 2005 (UTC)
[edit] Hydroelectricity, water level falling
The reason, says the report, is to maintain sufficient flows of water over the dam's turbines and keep the lights on in Uganda.
"The resultant over-release of water... is contributing to the severe drop in water level in Lake Victoria," says the report, written by Daniel Kull, a hydrological engineer based in Nairobi, for International Rivers Network, a US green group.
The Owens Fall hydroelectric project dates back to 1954.
Until then, the lake spilled out over a natural rock weir, to form the Victoria Nile, which eventually becomes the White Nile.
Britain, Uganda's colonial power, blasted out the weir and replaced it with the first dam, now called the Nalubaale dam, thus effectively transforming Lake Victoria into a vast hydroelectric reservoir.
Maybe someone can build on this? Ksenon 19:20, 9 February 2006 (UTC)
[edit] size?
I read in World book it is 26,828 sq miles. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 209.206.165.12 (talk) 03:27, 3 February 2007 (UTC).
[edit] Old name of Lake Victoria
I wonder if anybody has any information or citations regarding the past names of Lake Victoria. I am reading some journal extracts of Dr Johann Ludwig Krapf in Kenya Mountain, E.A.T. Dutton, 1929 and came across a discrepency. The locals keep giving Dr Krapf descriptions of where they believe Mount Kenya's rivers flow. The lake that is repeatedly described seems to match the description of Lake Victoria. The locals always refer to it as Lake Baringo. But the description definitely doesn't fit. Some entries are years apart and the people he interviews different, so it is unlikely to simply be a mistake during the interview. I am wondering if Lake Vicotria might have been called Lake Baringo originally and then in the confusion of Europeans naming things, the label Lake Baringo got applied to the wrong lake?
Here is an entry from 1st October 1851. It is from pg 77 of his diary. It was published in Church Missionary Intelligencer vol. iii, 1852 which is where Kenya Mountain copies it from.
The last mentioned river goes north-east into a much larger lake, called Baringo. This lake, according to my informer, has no end, although one should travel for a hundred days to see the end; nor can the opposite shore be seen.
Another entry from the same Church Missionary Intelligencer but from Krapf's journal entry of 5th August 1852 states:
When Rumu mentioned the great extent of the lake Baringo, it occurred to my mind whether this great inland sea was not identical with the large sea of Uniamesi, of which the natives know neither the end nor its commencement.
The current Lake Baringo is fairly small and can be walked around in a few days at most. The opposite shore can (almost?) always be seen. I can't imagine how it would be described as a never ending lake.
Does anybody have any knowledge about this discrepancy? If anyone has any sources then it would make an interesting addition to the article.
Mehmet Karatay 23:05, 15 May 2007 (UTC)
- I found a reference showing that Lake Victoria was indeed known as Baringo before Europeans renamed it. Here is an extract from page xlviii of the introduction of Travels and Missionary Labours in East Africa written by Ludwig Krapf in 1860:
It is very remarkable that Captain Speke should have seen the great lake which Rumu wa Kikandi, a native of Uemba, near the snowcapped mountain Kegnia, mentioned to me under the name "Baringu," the end of which cannot be found, "even if you travel a hundred days' distance along its shores," as my informant expressed himself. It is further remarkable that Captain Speke very properly named it Victoria Nyanza, in honour of Her Majesty...
- I think this is a very interesting and important fact that should be worked into the article. Any suggestions where it should go? Mehmet Karatay 21:30, 29 May 2007 (UTC)
Egypt Any mention of the problems with Egypt! Not too familiar with them myself but its something to the effect that they actually own the lake and East African countries need permission to use the lakes recourses because of The Nile Treaty of 1929 between Egypt and Great Britain, which was signed on behalf of its East African colonies, giving full control of the river and its resources to Egypt, or does that only affect the river Nile I wonder if any scientist have thought tnat Lake Victoria was a giant impact crater ? Looks like one to me.
