Are small rivers decreasing in number?
“Nowadays there are over 22,000 small rivers in Ukraine, although a couple decades ago specialists estimated their number at more than 60,000. When we were children, there were rivers that you could drink water from, for example, the Lybid and the Samara. The latter was once navigable but by now transformed into a cascade of lakes. Its water, which used to be clear and soft, is now being reported to be the most polluted water in the Dnieper Basin. “According to a report of Ukraine s Ministry of Environment Protection, the salinity of the Oril, the Samara, and the Vovcha exceed permissible limits. The reason is coal mining near these rivers in the western Donbas for the past 50 years. No one would dare to commit this kind of crime in any other country of Europe: millions of cubic meters of brine pumped out of coal mines go into the rivers. The same kind of situation is with the Inhulets River: it is being polluted by the ore mining and smelting complex. The rivers in the Donbas Basin ar
