River
Kouilou-Niari River
560 km from source to mouth · Republic of the Congo.
Republic of the CongoFlows into Atlantic Ocean3rd longest in Republic of the Congo
In numbers
Length
560km
Average flow
860m³/s
Basin
61,707km²
Drop
207m
from 209 m to 2 m
Country
1
The journey
From source to mouth
560 km of river and 6 stops on the way: 4 towns and cities on its banks, dams, bridges and the tributaries that feed it.
- 0 kmSourceat 209 m
- 102 kmBouenzatributary
- 171 kmNkayi103,000 people
- 207 kmLoudima20,391 people
- 340 kmMakabana13,401 people
- 486 kmKibangou3,069 people
- 508 kmLac Dinga4.8 km²
- 560 kmAtlantic Oceanat 2 m
Water level along the river (RiverATLAS; the height is exaggerated). Towns: GeoNames and Wikidata; bridges, dams and tributaries: Wikidata.
River in the Republic of the Congo
At the mouth it carries 856 m³/s on average: an Olympic pool every 2.9 seconds. It drops from 209 m to 2 m, 0.4 m per kilometre on average. Its basin covers 61,707 km², about the size of LV. 683,000 people live in it. Highest water: from December to January and April; lowest: from July to October. No large dam holds it back: it is one of the world's free-flowing rivers.
Where to start
- NkayiLargest city on its banks · 103,000 people
- Antonio Agostinho-Neto International Airport (PNR)Nearest airport with scheduled flights, 170 km from the city
- On the water1 ferry piers, marinas, boat rentals and boat ramps along the river (OpenStreetMap)
- From June to SeptemberThe best months to visit
Kouilou-Niari River, month by month
Highest water: from December to January and April
Lowest water: from July to October. Best months to visit: from June to September.
From about 230 m³/s in the lowest month to 1,800 m³/s in the highest. An estimate: the monthly flow is modelled from the lowest and highest months of WaterGAP (RiverATLAS, 1971–2000) and the rain and snow along the river (WorldClim). Dams change the real rhythm. The chip is the average air temperature; below it, the month's rain.
Plan the trip
Plan the trip: boat trips, a bed by the river, a car
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The basin
Kouilou-Niari River: the basin in numbers
59,759 km² of land send their water to this river. This is what lives on it.
- 683,000people live in the basin
- 11/km²people per km²
- 383maverage altitude of the basin
- 1,486mmof rain a year (basin average)
- 24.1°Caverage air temperature
- 1%protected areas
- 0.1%covered by lakes
What covers the basin
- 71% Forest
- 1% Cropland
- 9% Pasture
RiverATLAS (HydroATLAS v1.0, CC BY 4.0): land cover, people, protected areas, glaciers and dams over the whole basin upstream of the mouth.
Along the river
Kouilou-Niari River: what you find on the way
- 2WaterfallsMboulou
- 1Marinas
From OpenStreetMap, within 2.3 km of the river. Not mapped is not the same as not there.
Cross-checked with our atlases
Kouilou-Niari River in our other atlases
What our sister atlases know about the waterfalls on this river, the lakes it flows through, the beaches at its mouth, the mountains where it rises and the islands off its mouth.
1lake on its wayLakeyas
1mountain at the sourcePeakyas
Lakes and reservoirs (1)
Lakes it flows through, by Lakeyas
- Lac Dingakm 5264.8km²
Lakeyas is coming soonOpen Lakeyas ↗
Mountains at the source (1)
Within 15 km of the source, by Peakyas
- Mont de Migaya14 km away
From space
The source and the mouth, seen from orbit
Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 by EOX IT Services GmbH (contains modified Copernicus Sentinel data 2016), CC BY 4.0. The glowing line is the river as drawn by RiverATLAS.
Tributaries
Where it flows, and what flows into it
Tributaries (1)
Also: Bouenza
Angola
GabonWhere these numbers come from
| Name, length, places | Wikidata (Q1637839) · CC0 |
|---|---|
| Course, profile, basin | RiverATLAS v1.0 (HydroATLAS, Linke et al. 2019) · CC BY 4.0 — followed along the river network from the point given by Wikidata |
| Flow | WaterGAP (RiverATLAS), 1971–2000 · CC BY 4.0 |
| Climate along the river | WorldClim (RiverATLAS), 1970–2000 · CC BY 4.0 |
| Towns, bridges, dams | Wikidata · CC0; GeoNames · CC BY 4.0 |
| Along the river | © OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL |
| Images | EOX Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 · CC BY 4.0; Wikimedia Commons |
| Our other atlases | Lakeyas, Peakyas — Wikidata · CC0; © OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL; GeoNames · CC BY 4.0; HydroLAKES · CC BY 4.0; NOAA OISST |
Every source and licence is on the data sources page.
The family
Do you prefer beaches, lakes, mountains, waterfalls, islands, rivers or canyons?
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