TEFÉ, Amazonas — “I’ve lived on this floating home for 40 years, and this is the worst drought I’ve ever seen. You can see that the water dropped well below the 2023 levels,” says Carlos Magno, as he shows the point reached by the water last year. “That’s a scary scenario to watch. And it gets even scarier because of the news that this is going to get worse every year.” Magno is a boat mechanic and lives on a floating house on the water, usually built of wood or metal, on the shores of Lake Tefé, in the municipality of the same name located in the heart of Amazonas state. While he and his family love living by the lake, where they are surrounded by water, forest and animals, they are now considering moving to dry land because of increasingly severe droughts. “The floating house is already completely on land. Take a look here to see how much the water level has dropped. This drought is almost 30 days longer; it usually doesn’t get to this point,” he says, worried. The water needs to rise so Magno can get back to work. Because of low river and lake levels, boats stop traveling and he loses clients. He has had no work for two months now. Lake Tefé, a lagoon formation of the Tefé River near the point where it meets the Solimões, has been experiencing a historic drought this year, reaching just 4.5 meters (14.9 feet) — 13.5 m…This article was originally published on Mongabay
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