From its source on the Tibetan plateau, the Yangtze River winds its way 3,900 miles through China and terminates near the mega-city of Shanghai.
The Yangtze is one of the world’s longest, most powerful rivers.
For more than 2,000 years, it has played a key role in Chinese history as a source of drinking water, a crop irrigator, and a transportation network.
Although the Yangtze has supported lives, it has ended many others. In 1931, torrential rains caused the Yangtze to flood its banks.
This wiped out crops and lead to the deaths of an estimated 3.7 million people, making it one of the deadliest natural disasters in history.
In 1954, another round of flooding resulted in the deaths of more than 30,000 people.