7 ms·

Great Man-Made River

128 points by zeristor 6y ago

f6v 6y ago
That feels like a post-apocalyptic story now, remnants of great, more developed civilization.
- hutzlibu 6y ago
  "During the second Libyan civil war, lasting from 2014 to 2020, the water infrastructure suffered neglect and occasional breakdowns. As of July 2019, 101 of 479 wells on the western pipeline system had been dismantled" It is not all gone and still somewhat working, but how long?
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- cheph 6y ago
  Remind me again why the fuck Obama rallied NATO to fuck that country up again and how Obama is still seen as the messiah to socialist and progressives after doing that?
  - hulitu 6y ago
    Why ? They have oil. Cheap oil. They were competing with the British-American Oil companies.
  - f6v 6y ago
    It wasn’t just Obama. France, Italy, and Turkey perpetuate the conflict.
    - scythe 6y ago
      Obama didn't even "rally NATO" at all. France was the first mover. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_military_intervention_in_Libya#Timeline https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_military_intervention_in_... >23 February 2011: French President Nicolas Sarkozy pushed for the European Union (EU) to pass sanctions against Gaddafi (freezing Gaddafi family funds abroad) and demand he stop attacks against civilians. >26 February 2011: United Nations Security Council Resolution 1970 was passed unanimously, referring the Libyan government to the International Criminal Court for gross human rights violations. >28 February 2011: British Prime Minister David Cameron proposed the idea of a no-fly zone >1 March 2011: The US Senate unanimously passed non-binding Senate resolution S.RES.85 urging the United Nations Security Council to impose a Libyan no-fly zone >2 March 2011: The Governor General of Canada-in-Council authorised, on the advice of Prime Minister of Canada Stephen Harper >7 March 2011: US Ambassador to NATO Ivo Daalder announced that NATO decided to step up surveillance missions of E-3 AWACS aircraft to twenty-four hours a day. France, the UK, the UNSC, the US Senate, and Canada all made moves before Obama's executive branch took any major actions. (Notably, all except the UNSC were controlled by right-wing political parties at the time.) But Obama is the most popular political figure in the country and has been for a decade, and it's lonely at the top... https://today.yougov.com/ratings/politics/popularity/politicians/all https://today.yougov.com/ratings/politics/popularity/politic...
      - f6v 6y ago
        > United Nations Security Council Resolution 1970 It's a shame China and Russia voted in favour.
  - carschno 6y ago
    Would you have one example of "how Obama is still seen as the messiah to socialist[s]"?
    - mlillie 6y ago
      Yeah, socialist here, and I am absolutely no fan of Obama's...
    - f6v 6y ago
      Tech companies are dem and shape the public opinion?
- billfruit 6y ago
  Similar perhaps, the rather extensive rail network in Middle East and Arabian Peninsula which were blown up in the First World war, most of it was never mended.
JetAlone 6y ago
Really fantastic project. Gives me Dune vibes. May it long continue to supply many with the water they need.
- 3131s 6y ago
  It seems to be struggling currently, but certainly it's already proven to be a resilient piece of infrastructure given the circumstances: On 22 July during the 2011 Libyan civil war, one of the two plants making pipes for the project, the Brega Plant, was hit by a NATO air strike.[18] At a press conference on 26 July, NATO claimed that rockets had been fired from within the plant area, and that military material, including multiple rocket launchers, was stored there according to intelligence findings, presenting a photo showing a BM-21 MRL as an example.[19] During the second Libyan civil war, lasting from 2014 to 2020, the water infrastructure suffered neglect and occasional breakdowns. As of July 2019, 101 of 479 wells on the western pipeline system had been dismantled.[20] On 10 April 2020, a station controlling water flow to Tripoli and neighboring towns was seized by an unknown armed group. The flow of water was cut to over two million people as a result, and as such the attack was condemned by the United Nations on humanitarian grounds.[21]
thendrill 6y ago
I grew up in Libya during the building of the GMMR. I still remember the size of the pipes and the amount of trucks hauling them. One truck one pipe. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nubian_Sandstone_Aquifer_System#/media/File%3AManMadeRiverLibya-7A.jpg https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nubian_Sandstone_Aquifer_Sys... The Korean companies building the project were massive. They would build a double lane road. One side would be used exclusively for one direction pipe supplies and machines. Eventually when the section completed they would just open the road as a public highway. This really helped Libya build up reach and infrastructure. The truck lines were endless... We are talking km long here... Eventually when the water reached the coast, I remember I was in Benghazi then. It was good and drinkable from the spring ( this is usually not possible since the water is still salty from the sea) after about a week the sweet water stopped because they started mixing it with the old supply to conserve the desert supplies, the water amount in the desert was over estimated... All in all Libya was a great country. My family moved to Europe and I remember how much miss information there was about Libya. The 2012 happened... Ama about the GMMR. I ll try to answer as best as I can and remember.
- cheph 6y ago
  I guess you are being downvoted because you are saying that Libya was better off before Obama "saved" it. Seriously fuck him for his warmongering, he should be rotting in jail for what he did.
  - smusamashah 6y ago
    Downvotes are because @thendrill made a copy paste comment from @Viker. Or may be that one is. Two profiles probably.
    - agurk 6y ago
      I've seen this a few times recently here - a comment being copy/pasted exactly for the same article. Is this something that's common but I've only just noticed, a coincidence or something else that's going on? Perhaps something Dang knows about.
    - 6y ago
Viker 6y ago
I grew up in Libya during the building of the GMMR. I still remember the size of the pipes and the amount of trucks hauling them. One truck one pipe. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nubian_Sandstone_Aquifer_System#/media/File%3AManMadeRiverLibya-7A.jpg https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nubian_Sandstone_Aquifer_Sys... The Korean companies (Daewoo mainly I think) building the project were massive. They would build a double lane road. One side would be used exclusively for one direction pipe supplies and machines. Eventually when the section completed they would just open the road as a public highway. This really helped Libya build up reach and infrastructure. The truck lines were endless... We are talking km long here... Eventually when the water reached the coast, I remember I was in Benghazi then. It was good and drinkable from the spring ( this is usually not possible since the water is still salty from the sea) after about a week the sweet water stopped because they started mixing it with the old supply to conserve the desert supplies, the water amount in the desert was over estimated... All in all Libya was a great country. My family moved to Europe and I remember how much miss information there was about Libya. Then 2012 happened... Ama about the GMMR. I ll try to answer as best as I can and remember.
- lqet 6y ago
  > this is usually not possible since the water is still salty from the sea Excuse my naive question, but where did the population get drinking water from prior to the GMMR?
  - Viker 6y ago
    Depends where in the country you are.. Parts of the coast in Libya is really harsh and desert. Mountain parts from Benghazi and eastward and Tripoli and westward. There are some small springs around also, water wells can be dug in various places. But when the urbanization really started I think most water for the big cities came from salt water processing plants.
- einpoklum 6y ago
  1. How come so much water collects in the desert, rather than closer to the coastline? 2. Is there some decent English text, in a book or online, which describes how Libyan society worked up until 2012? With focus on social and political structures and their interaction?
cookiengineer 6y ago
I am always amazed by human engineering. I grew up near the Rhine in Germany, and literally they changed the position of the whole river into a different shape, depth, and form so that ships can flow on it. The planning of the event was called "Rheinbegradigung" [1] and they made the river straight, with lots and lots of watergates in between from the Ocean right up to Basel in Switzerland. Eversince I grew up, hundreds of "Guetermotorschiffe" [2] were flowing up and down the rivers here, transporting coal, ores, stones, metal, even plane parts from Airbus. Their travel routes were all across Europe, as the Rhine has lots of side rivers that are connected orthogonally to it. And they started the Rheinbegradigung in 1817 and completed it in 1876, which is totally insane from the perspective of the available technology at the time. [1] https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rheinbegradigung https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rheinbegradigung [2] https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%BCtermotorschiff https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%BCtermotorschiff
- lqet 6y ago
  Here is a painting of the view from the "Isteiner Klotz" in southwestern Germany prior to the "Rheinbegradigung": https://www.gkgbs.ch/obsolet/schulleben/oekowoche/1998-2003/landschaftswandel/isteiner-klotz/bild1_1.jpg/@@images/e625f3b9-43f7-4e14-925a-fcbd7c489fde.jpeg https://www.gkgbs.ch/obsolet/schulleben/oekowoche/1998-2003/... Here is a picture of the (approximately) same view today (well, 20 years ago), you can use the church for orientation. The Rhine is at the far right corner. The village once had a small fishing harbor. https://www.gkgbs.ch/obsolet/schulleben/oekowoche/1998-2003/landschaftswandel/isteiner-klotz/bild1_2.jpg/@@images/4ba10283-070b-47c3-a851-b4416f97dcc6.jpeg https://www.gkgbs.ch/obsolet/schulleben/oekowoche/1998-2003/... > which is totally insane from the perspective of the available technology at the time. What they did was pretty clever: they didn't dig an entire new river bed (that would've been impossible), but only some small, narrow shortcut "pilot beds", protected by a dam. You can see such a shortcut here: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/07/K%C3%BChkopfDurchstich.JPG/1024px-K%C3%BChkopfDurchstich.JPG https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/07/K%... After the shortcut was finished, they opened up the dam. The Rhine then slowly dug a new bed itself.
  - tk75x 6y ago
aaron695 6y ago
OT I guess but the Wagner Group have recently dug a 43 mile fortified trench near Sirte - https://edition.cnn.com/2021/01/22/africa/libya-trench-russia-intl/index.html https://edition.cnn.com/2021/01/22/africa/libya-trench-russi...
mrtobo 6y ago
Reminds me of something I built in Factorio.

128 points by zeristor 6y ago

f6v 6y ago

That feels like a post-apocalyptic story now, remnants of great, more developed civilization.

hutzlibu 6y ago
"During the second Libyan civil war, lasting from 2014 to 2020, the water infrastructure suffered neglect and occasional breakdowns. As of July 2019, 101 of 479 wells on the western pipeline system had been dismantled" It is not all gone and still somewhat working, but how long?
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
cheph 6y ago
Remind me again why the fuck Obama rallied NATO to fuck that country up again and how Obama is still seen as the messiah to socialist and progressives after doing that?
- hulitu 6y ago
  Why ? They have oil. Cheap oil. They were competing with the British-American Oil companies.
- f6v 6y ago
  It wasn’t just Obama. France, Italy, and Turkey perpetuate the conflict.
  - scythe 6y ago
    Obama didn't even "rally NATO" at all. France was the first mover. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_military_intervention_in_Libya#Timeline https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_military_intervention_in_... >23 February 2011: French President Nicolas Sarkozy pushed for the European Union (EU) to pass sanctions against Gaddafi (freezing Gaddafi family funds abroad) and demand he stop attacks against civilians. >26 February 2011: United Nations Security Council Resolution 1970 was passed unanimously, referring the Libyan government to the International Criminal Court for gross human rights violations. >28 February 2011: British Prime Minister David Cameron proposed the idea of a no-fly zone >1 March 2011: The US Senate unanimously passed non-binding Senate resolution S.RES.85 urging the United Nations Security Council to impose a Libyan no-fly zone >2 March 2011: The Governor General of Canada-in-Council authorised, on the advice of Prime Minister of Canada Stephen Harper >7 March 2011: US Ambassador to NATO Ivo Daalder announced that NATO decided to step up surveillance missions of E-3 AWACS aircraft to twenty-four hours a day. France, the UK, the UNSC, the US Senate, and Canada all made moves before Obama's executive branch took any major actions. (Notably, all except the UNSC were controlled by right-wing political parties at the time.) But Obama is the most popular political figure in the country and has been for a decade, and it's lonely at the top... https://today.yougov.com/ratings/politics/popularity/politicians/all https://today.yougov.com/ratings/politics/popularity/politic...
    - f6v 6y ago
      > United Nations Security Council Resolution 1970 It's a shame China and Russia voted in favour.
- carschno 6y ago
  Would you have one example of "how Obama is still seen as the messiah to socialist[s]"?
  - mlillie 6y ago
    Yeah, socialist here, and I am absolutely no fan of Obama's...
  - f6v 6y ago
    Tech companies are dem and shape the public opinion?
billfruit 6y ago
Similar perhaps, the rather extensive rail network in Middle East and Arabian Peninsula which were blown up in the First World war, most of it was never mended.

JetAlone 6y ago

Really fantastic project. Gives me Dune vibes. May it long continue to supply many with the water they need.

3131s 6y ago
It seems to be struggling currently, but certainly it's already proven to be a resilient piece of infrastructure given the circumstances: On 22 July during the 2011 Libyan civil war, one of the two plants making pipes for the project, the Brega Plant, was hit by a NATO air strike.[18] At a press conference on 26 July, NATO claimed that rockets had been fired from within the plant area, and that military material, including multiple rocket launchers, was stored there according to intelligence findings, presenting a photo showing a BM-21 MRL as an example.[19] During the second Libyan civil war, lasting from 2014 to 2020, the water infrastructure suffered neglect and occasional breakdowns. As of July 2019, 101 of 479 wells on the western pipeline system had been dismantled.[20] On 10 April 2020, a station controlling water flow to Tripoli and neighboring towns was seized by an unknown armed group. The flow of water was cut to over two million people as a result, and as such the attack was condemned by the United Nations on humanitarian grounds.[21]

thendrill 6y ago

I grew up in Libya during the building of the GMMR. I still remember the size of the pipes and the amount of trucks hauling them. One truck one pipe. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nubian_Sandstone_Aquifer_System#/media/File%3AManMadeRiverLibya-7A.jpg https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nubian_Sandstone_Aquifer_Sys... The Korean companies building the project were massive. They would build a double lane road. One side would be used exclusively for one direction pipe supplies and machines. Eventually when the section completed they would just open the road as a public highway. This really helped Libya build up reach and infrastructure. The truck lines were endless... We are talking km long here... Eventually when the water reached the coast, I remember I was in Benghazi then. It was good and drinkable from the spring ( this is usually not possible since the water is still salty from the sea) after about a week the sweet water stopped because they started mixing it with the old supply to conserve the desert supplies, the water amount in the desert was over estimated... All in all Libya was a great country. My family moved to Europe and I remember how much miss information there was about Libya. The 2012 happened... Ama about the GMMR. I ll try to answer as best as I can and remember.

cheph 6y ago
I guess you are being downvoted because you are saying that Libya was better off before Obama "saved" it. Seriously fuck him for his warmongering, he should be rotting in jail for what he did.
- smusamashah 6y ago
  Downvotes are because @thendrill made a copy paste comment from @Viker. Or may be that one is. Two profiles probably.
  - agurk 6y ago
    I've seen this a few times recently here - a comment being copy/pasted exactly for the same article. Is this something that's common but I've only just noticed, a coincidence or something else that's going on? Perhaps something Dang knows about.
  - 6y ago

Viker 6y ago

I grew up in Libya during the building of the GMMR. I still remember the size of the pipes and the amount of trucks hauling them. One truck one pipe. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nubian_Sandstone_Aquifer_System#/media/File%3AManMadeRiverLibya-7A.jpg https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nubian_Sandstone_Aquifer_Sys... The Korean companies (Daewoo mainly I think) building the project were massive. They would build a double lane road. One side would be used exclusively for one direction pipe supplies and machines. Eventually when the section completed they would just open the road as a public highway. This really helped Libya build up reach and infrastructure. The truck lines were endless... We are talking km long here... Eventually when the water reached the coast, I remember I was in Benghazi then. It was good and drinkable from the spring ( this is usually not possible since the water is still salty from the sea) after about a week the sweet water stopped because they started mixing it with the old supply to conserve the desert supplies, the water amount in the desert was over estimated... All in all Libya was a great country. My family moved to Europe and I remember how much miss information there was about Libya. Then 2012 happened... Ama about the GMMR. I ll try to answer as best as I can and remember.

lqet 6y ago
> this is usually not possible since the water is still salty from the sea Excuse my naive question, but where did the population get drinking water from prior to the GMMR?
- Viker 6y ago
  Depends where in the country you are.. Parts of the coast in Libya is really harsh and desert. Mountain parts from Benghazi and eastward and Tripoli and westward. There are some small springs around also, water wells can be dug in various places. But when the urbanization really started I think most water for the big cities came from salt water processing plants.
einpoklum 6y ago
1. How come so much water collects in the desert, rather than closer to the coastline? 2. Is there some decent English text, in a book or online, which describes how Libyan society worked up until 2012? With focus on social and political structures and their interaction?

cookiengineer 6y ago

I am always amazed by human engineering. I grew up near the Rhine in Germany, and literally they changed the position of the whole river into a different shape, depth, and form so that ships can flow on it. The planning of the event was called "Rheinbegradigung" [1] and they made the river straight, with lots and lots of watergates in between from the Ocean right up to Basel in Switzerland. Eversince I grew up, hundreds of "Guetermotorschiffe" [2] were flowing up and down the rivers here, transporting coal, ores, stones, metal, even plane parts from Airbus. Their travel routes were all across Europe, as the Rhine has lots of side rivers that are connected orthogonally to it. And they started the Rheinbegradigung in 1817 and completed it in 1876, which is totally insane from the perspective of the available technology at the time. [1] https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rheinbegradigung https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rheinbegradigung [2] https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%BCtermotorschiff https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%BCtermotorschiff

lqet 6y ago
Here is a painting of the view from the "Isteiner Klotz" in southwestern Germany prior to the "Rheinbegradigung": https://www.gkgbs.ch/obsolet/schulleben/oekowoche/1998-2003/landschaftswandel/isteiner-klotz/bild1_1.jpg/@@images/e625f3b9-43f7-4e14-925a-fcbd7c489fde.jpeg https://www.gkgbs.ch/obsolet/schulleben/oekowoche/1998-2003/... Here is a picture of the (approximately) same view today (well, 20 years ago), you can use the church for orientation. The Rhine is at the far right corner. The village once had a small fishing harbor. https://www.gkgbs.ch/obsolet/schulleben/oekowoche/1998-2003/landschaftswandel/isteiner-klotz/bild1_2.jpg/@@images/4ba10283-070b-47c3-a851-b4416f97dcc6.jpeg https://www.gkgbs.ch/obsolet/schulleben/oekowoche/1998-2003/... > which is totally insane from the perspective of the available technology at the time. What they did was pretty clever: they didn't dig an entire new river bed (that would've been impossible), but only some small, narrow shortcut "pilot beds", protected by a dam. You can see such a shortcut here: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/07/K%C3%BChkopfDurchstich.JPG/1024px-K%C3%BChkopfDurchstich.JPG https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/07/K%... After the shortcut was finished, they opened up the dam. The Rhine then slowly dug a new bed itself.
- tk75x 6y ago

aaron695 6y ago

OT I guess but the Wagner Group have recently dug a 43 mile fortified trench near Sirte - https://edition.cnn.com/2021/01/22/africa/libya-trench-russia-intl/index.html https://edition.cnn.com/2021/01/22/africa/libya-trench-russi...

mrtobo 6y ago

Reminds me of something I built in Factorio.