Atacama Desert

Atacama Desert

The Atacama Desert of Chile covers the northern third of the country stretching 1,000km (600 miles) and straddles the southern border of Peru. Bound on the west by barren hills and mountains on the Pacific coast it extends east into the Andes mountains. At an average elevation of about 4 kilometers (13,000 feet) it is not only the highest desert in the world but also the driest. In some parts rainfall has never been recorded. Vegitation is almost non-existent with 0.6mm to 2.1mm of rain falling around the region. Average daily temperatures range between 0°C-25°C making the Atacama relatively cool compared with the Sahara or the Great Sandy desert's.

Despite extremes and desolation there is stunning beauty. With the Andes as a backdrop the desert contains five snow topped volcanoes which are the highest volcanoes in the world and the highest elevations in South America.

Geography of the Atacama

Scene from Valle de la Luna (Moon Valley) near San Pedro de Atacama.

The Atacama Desert has one of the most unique and seemingly hostile environments on the planet. Immediate surroundings are major contributing factors influencing its formation and physical characteristics. Just to the west and immediatley below is the meeting point of the oceanic Nazca Plate and the continental South American Plate. The resultant tectonic action is constantly pushing the Andes ever higher and creates powerfull volcanic and seismic activity. At the eastern edge of the Nazca Plate, 160km (100 miles) off the coast the plate is subducted leaving the Peru-Chile (Attacama) Trench. It reaches a maximum depth of 26,460 feet (8,065 m) below sea level and is approximately 3,666 miles (5,900 km) long; it covers an expanse of some 228,000 square miles (590,000 square km). The proximity to this very large body of cold water has a substantial effect. Due mainly to the westerlies; prevailing winds which drive the cool ocean Humboldt Current (or Peru) through these cold waters. Ocean air is cooled by the current without moisture being retained to generate precipitation (clouds and fog are produced however). Also upwelling occurs off Peru year-round but off Chile only during the spring and summer. Co-incidently cold, nutrient-rich water brought to the surface by upwelling brings about extraordinary productivity and the Humboldt Current supports the world’s largest fisheries.

Another climatic factor is the desert lies where the westerlies and the southern trade winds intersect at 25° south. Here, the surface winds are rushing away both to the north and south, and so air from higher up must descend to fill the gap. Ascending air causes rain: descending air tends to prevent rain. This phenomenon is not unique to the Atacama: almost all the major deserts of the world lie between 20° and 30° north or south latitude.

The on shore result of both climatic and topographical effects is that the Atacama Desert is the driest place on Earth, and is virtually sterile because it is blocked from moisture on either side by the Andes and the coastal mountains. The landscape and soil more closely resemble those of the planet Mars. It was thought that some soils contained no life at all until recently when a new species of Deinococcus bacteria was found.

The lack of rain is not a new phenomenon. Dr Tibor Dunai was speaking before the American Geophysical Union and told the BBC in a news article: "We found loose sediment surfaces that would be washed away by any desert rainfall and these are older than 20 million years," he said. This is much older than other hyper-arid regions, such as the Dry Valleys of Antarctica (10-11 million years) and the Namib desert in Africa (5 million years). "The origin of the aridity in the Atacama dates back to the opening of ocean pathways - the opening between South America and Antarctica, and between Australia and the Antarctic.

Some locations in the Atacama do receive marine fog, providing sufficient moisture for hypolithic algae, lichens and even some cacti. But in the region that is in the "fog shadow" of the high coastal crest-line - the crest-line of the coastal range averages 3,000 m for about 100 km south of Antofagasta - the soil has been compared to that of Mars.

Human occupation

Atacama road.

Archeological evidence indicates that the San Pedro area was the center of a Paleolithic civilization that built rock fortresses on the steep mountains encircling the valley.

The original inhabitants of the region were the Atacameños, an extinct Indian culture different from that of the Aymaras to the north and the Diaguitas to the south.

The Atacama is presently inhabited, though sparsely populated. In an oasis, in the middle of the desert, at an elevation of some 2000 meters, is the village of San Pedro de Atacama. Its church was built by the Spanish in 1577.

The Escondida Mine and Chuquicamata are also located within the Atacama.

The Pan-American Highway runs through the Atacama in a north-south trajectory.

The European Southern Observatory operates two major observatories in the Atacama Desert:

• The La Silla Observatory
• The Paranal Observatory, which includes the Very Large Telescope.

A new radio astronomy observatory, called ALMA, is being built in the Atacama Desert by astronomers from Europe, Japan, and North America.

Another radio astronomy observatory, ACT, is being built on Cerro Toco in the Atacama Desert.

Abandoned nitrate mining towns

File:Chile-Tatio-Geyser.jpg

Geyser of Tatio in Atacama desert, Chile

The Atacama has rich deposits of copper and other minerals, and the world's largest natural supply of sodium nitrate, which was mined on a large scale until the early 1940s. The Atacama border dispute between Chile and Bolivia began in the 1800s over these resources.

Currently, the Atacama Desert is littered with approximately 170 abandoned nitrate (or "saltpeter") mining towns, almost all of which were shut down decades after the invention of synthetic nitrate in Germany at the turn of the 20th century. Some of these abandoned towns include Chacabuco, Humberstone, Santa Laura, Pedro de Valdivia, Puelma, Maria Elena and Oficina Anita. Chacabuco is a special case since it was later converted into a concentration camp during Pinochet's regime. To this day it is surrounded by 98 lost landmines and is guarded by one man who lives there alone.

The Atacama border dispute was border dispute between Chile and Bolivia in the 1800s that ended in Chilean annexation of all of the Bolivian Coast and the southern tip of Bolivias ally Peru, during the War of the Pacific (1879-1883). Later Peru and Argentina got also involved in the dispute. Some consider the dispute is still ongoing as Bolivia still claims an sovereign acces to the Pacific Ocean. The conflic takes name from the Atacama Desert on wich lies the disputed territory.

Border dispute

File:Tarapaca.jpg

Borders between Peru, Bolivia and Chile before the 1879 War of the Pacific (note: map does not faithfully represent some of the border, particularly the Bolivia-Argentina one.)

The origins of the Atacama Border dispute cames from the borders established in the Spanish empire that just defined the Atacama desert as the northern border of the Kingdom of Chile. Bolivian and Chilean historians disagree on whether the territory of Charcas, originally part of the Viceroyalty of Peru, later of the Viceroyalty of the Río de la Plata and ultimately of Bolivia, included access to the sea. Supporting their claims with different documents, Bolivians claim that it did while Chileans disagree. When Simón Bolívar established Bolivia as a nation, he claimed access to the sea, although most economic exploitation of the coastal region was being conducted by Chilean companies and British interests, under the aegis of Chile's more robust economy and more stable institutions.

The border dispute beetwen Bolivia and Chile grew slowly during most of the 1800s over the Atacama corridor, a part of the Atacama Desert which now forms northern Chile. The Atacama Desert is bordered by the Coast Range on the west and the Andes on the east. The geography of the area was a very large factor in determining how the border dispute began. Because of the mountains, the area has rains only 2 to 4 times a century, making it one of the driest places on Earth.

After the independence of Chile (1818) and Bolivia (1825) none of the following governments of both countries cared about defining its borders. National boundaries in the Atacama region had still not been definitely determined when nitrate, silver and copper deposits were discovered in the area. Both Bolivia and Chile established competing claims for the territory. Chilean Other countries' interest was drawn due to the importance of nitrates in the production of fertilizer and high explosives; Britain, Spain and the United States had a strategic and economic stake in controlling the resource. Chiles influence grew in the disputed zone as miners, some of them backed by Chilean and forgein companies, started to advance northwards establishing mines and port facilities.

National borders in the region had not been clearly agreed until 1866; the two countries had negotiated a treaty that established the 24th parallel as their boundary, and entitled Bolivia and Chile to share in tax revenue on mineral exports out of the territory between the 23rd and 25th parallels. A second treaty in 1874 superseded this, entitling Bolivia to collect full tax revenue between the 23rd and 24th parallels, but fixed tax rates on Chilean companies for 25 years. Bolivia subsequently became dissatisfied at the arrangement, as Chilean interests backed by British capital quickly expanded and controlled the mining industry, and feared Chilean encroachment on its coastal region.

The War of the Pacific

A treaty made in 1874 allowed Chile to exploit the area without exploitation fees for a period of 25 years. Four years later, another Bolivian government rejected the treaty and attempted to raise taxes on a Chilean nitrate company. As an answer to this action, the Chilean army occupied Antofagasta, by that time a Bolivian city. Chile declared war on Bolivia in March 1879, and on Bolivia's secret ally, Peru in May 1879, starting the War of the Pacific. Within four years Chile defeated the joint war efforts of Bolivia and Peru. While Bolivian troops retired from the dispted region early in the war, the Chilean Army had to occupy Peru's capital Lima to finally get a peace treaty.

Under the terms of the Treaty of Ancón,[1] Chile was to occupy the provinces of Tacna and Arica for 10 years, after which a plebiscite was to be held to determine their nationality. The two countries failed for decades to agree on the terms of the plebiscite. Finally in 1929, through the mediation of the United States under President Herbert Hoover, an accord was reached by which Chile kept Arica; Peru reacquired Tacna and received $6 million indemnity and other concessions. At the end of the war, Chile had acquired the Atacama corridor (now Atacama Region) as well as the province of Antofagasta (Antofagasta Region) and the Peruvian Tarapacá (Tarapacá Region), turning Bolivia into a landlocked state. In 1884, Bolivia signed a truce that gave control to Chile of the entire Bolivian coast, the province of Antofagasta, and its valuable nitrate, copper and other mineral deposits. A treaty in 1904 made this arrangement permanent. In return Chile agreed to build a railroad connecting the Bolivian capital of La Paz with the port of Arica and guaranteed freedom of transit for Bolivian commerce through Chilean ports and territory.

Chilean proposal of 1978

In 1978 the Chilean government of Augusto Pinochet made a proposal to Bolivia that included the ceding of some Chilean ports as Tocopilla to Bolivia, but not a corridor that would split Chile into two pieces. One of the main suspected reasons of this strange proposal by the right-wing nationalistic military regime of Chile was the ongoing Beagle conflict with Argentina over Picton, Lennox and Nueva Islands near Cape Horn. Chile wanted to secure Bolivia's neutrality if war started. The proposal involved former Peruvian land and according to the treaty of Ancon, Chile could not give former Peruvian territories to other nations without Peru's agreement. The leftist dictator of Peru Francisco Morales Bermúdez opposed to these changes but proposed to make Arica a territory governed by the tree states. Chile responded it could not accept this complicated shared sovereignty. Some argued that the Chilean proposal was made only to rise friendship with Bolivia as they knew it would not result. The same year Chilean relations with Bolivia severed and diplomatic relations were broken. Today Chile and Bolivia still only maintains consular relations.

Recent history

Bolivia still holds claims on the Atacama corridor, which Chile rejects, yet offers instead unrestricted but not sovereign maritime access through the territory for the export of Bolivian natural gas and other commodities. Today the territories lost by Bolvia and Peru gives the Chilean state nearly 40% of its income as the state owned company CODELCO exploit the world's biggest copper reserves.

During the Bolivian Gas War the dispute rose again, as most of the Bolivians, including the now president Evo Morales, opposed to the future export of Bolivian gas trough Chilean territory as the Government and the forgein companies wanted. In 2004 at the anniversary of the 1904 treaty fueled the Bolivian claims, and the words gas-for-sea became the slogan of people who opposed exportation. The dispute became evident wen Chilean president Ricardo Lagos faced the Bolivian president Carlos Mesa in the OEA, as Mesa spoke about the topic in front of all the presidents of the Americas.

With the rise of two socialist Michelle Bachelet in Chile as the first woman to be presint in her country, and Evo Morales as the first president of indian origin in Bolivia relations have improved in recent years.

Sources and Further Reading

• Braudel, Fernand, The perspective of the world, New York, Harper & Row, 1984, ISBN 0060153172
• Sagaris, Lake, Bone and dream : into the world's driest desert, Toronto, A.A. Knopf Canada, 2000, ISBN 0676972233
• Aarons, John; Vita-Finzi, Claudio, The useless land; a winter in the Atacama Desert, London, R. Hale, 1960, OCLC 2649656

External links

• Vesilind, Priit J., Parts of Chile's Atacama Desert haven't seen a drop of rain since recordkeeping began. Somehow, more than a million people squeeze life from this parched land, National Geographic, Accessed March 19, 2007
• Autonomous Robot Finds Life in Atacama Desert, Slash Dot, Accessed March 19, 2007
• Amos, Jonathan, December 8, 2005Chile desert's super-dry history, British Broadcasting Corporation, Accessed March 19, 2007
• Hudepohl, Gerhard, Atacama Desert Photographs, Atacama Photo, Accessed March 19, 2007

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