Yellow River from Far to Near (Chen Qiwen)

Chen Qiwen: Yellow River from Far to Near (Reportage)

Introduction:

The 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China proposed that the construction of ecological civilization should be placed in a prominent position, integrated into all aspects and the whole process of economic construction, political construction, cultural construction and social construction, and strive to build a beautiful China and realize the sustainable development of the Chinese nation.

The Yellow River, the mother river of the Chinese nation. For thousands of years, the descendants of the Chinese people have not only benefited from the nourishment of the Yellow River, but also suffered from its arrogance. This river is recognized as the most difficult to harness in the world. From the ancient people's embankment reinforcement to the present people's dam reinforcement, flood control and water storage, irrigation and power generation, water and sediment regulation, and then to the standardized embankment construction and water avoidance and security projects in the Yellow River beach, the Yellow River harness people all over the world have reflected their profound understanding of the harmonious coexistence between man and nature.

Xiaolangdi: the Gate of Life of the Yellow River

A yellow river with sediment is advancing rapidly in the Shanxi-Shaanxi Grand Canyon. All the way, like splashing ink on mountains and rivers, came to an abrupt end. At first glance, an ochre dam cut off the Yellow River. On the big river, you can feel an innate momentum full of waves. Suddenly I feel that I have no direction to go forward and forget the way home.

As we all know, the Yellow River is the most complicated and difficult to control in the world. The problems of all rivers in the world can be found on the Yellow River, which has the highest sediment, suspended river, cut-off and ecological crisis in the world. The flood of the Yellow River is actually not a flood, but a sand disaster. To put it more vividly: if the sediment of the Yellow River is piled into an earth wall with a width of one meter and a height of one meter, it is enough to circle the earth 27 times.

The people have governed the Yellow River for 60 years, and there is no breach in autumn and winter floods. Compared with the tragic history of "two breaks in three years", this is an impressive achievement, but no one dares to say that this is the complete end of that tragic history. For more than sixty years, a person's life is very long, and a big river is very short. No one can guarantee that the Yellow River will never burst or change its course. If analyzed more calmly and rationally, this impressive achievement is piled up at a very high price. The riverbed of the lower Yellow River is still silting up, rising by 10 cm every year. At first glance, it is insignificant. When you think about it, it's really shocking. One year 10 cm, 10 years is1m. In the past 60 years, the riverbed has been raised by more than 6 meters, almost two floors higher than the original riverbed. When I stand on the Yellow River embankment, I imagine a hanging river in the future, a hundred years later, a thousand years later …

A great man once asked worriedly: What if the Yellow River rises to the sky?

With the birth of Xiaolangdi water control project, a legendary idea, or a scientific myth, came into being-water and sediment regulation. Everything can only start with experiments. This is not a model experiment usually carried out in the laboratory, but an experiment based on spatial scale, which is a prototype experiment carried out on the Yellow River for thousands or even thousands of kilometers. This is an unprecedented experiment, and it is also the most complicated and dangerous experiment conducted by human beings on the most complicated and dangerous river in the world. A small mistake will be an incalculable disaster. On a Yellow River, human beings have experienced too many experiments, and many beautiful ideas finally fell short and failed in the investigation of the Yellow River. The controversy caused by this experiment is more intense than whether the Xiaolangdi project will be built or not. In the eyes of the approvers, this is a landmark technology for human beings to change from traditional Yellow River management to modern Yellow River management. To an outsider like me, this is a romantic legend full of fantasy; In the eyes of more people, this is simply a crazy scientific myth.

July 4th, 2002 is a day that will be written into the history of water conservancy in China and the history of water conservancy in the world. At this time, it is only half a year before the Xiaolangdi project is fully completed. At 9: 00 this morning, the first water and sediment regulation experiment of the Yellow River began. As Commander-in-Chief Lee calmly issued one instruction after another, the city gate slowly opened. When the upstream flood reached Xiaolangdi, the last gorge of the Yellow River, a grand, complex and fully functional water control project began to play the role of the main valve in the middle and lower reaches of the Yellow River. At the same time, the sluice gate of Xiaolangdi desilting tunnel was opened as instructed. For the lower reaches of the Yellow River, this is like opening the door to life. With the sluice gates of Xiaolangdi Hub 1 1 all opened as instructed, more than 3,000 cubic meters of water head gushed out from the spillway tunnels with different heights. With the birth of an unprecedented artificial flood peak, a well-planned flood process began. White and yellow water spewed out like dragons, showing two contrasting colors in the sun. This passionate wave suddenly seems to play back the time to the years when the wind roared, the horses barked and the Yellow River roared, and vented to the lower reaches of the Yellow River. The ancient, shrinking and lifeless lower reaches of the Yellow River were activated under the strong impact of this man-made flood. It was tentative at first. With the increasing flow, it began to become full of vitality, as if it had regained the unparalleled passion and strength of a big river. Under the strong scouring, it transported more than 60 million tons of sediment deposited in the main channel for many years to the sea. ...

At Xiaolangdi, I was lucky enough to see the largest Huang Helang, which is the flood peak shaped by human beings. In fact, the sediment of the Yellow River can also give birth to a strange natural phenomenon-uncovering the bottom of the river. This is the unique law of sediment movement in the Yellow River. When the flood peak with high sediment concentration passes by, the riverbed will be severely washed in a short time, and the pieces of sediment at the bottom of the river will be rolled up like a carpet, and then swept away by the current. Such intense scouring can make this section of riverbed several meters to more than ten meters deep in a few hours to dozens of hours. I wonder if the Yellow River is inspired by the natural phenomenon of "uncovering the bottom of the river", which looks more thrilling than uncovering the bottom of the river. I tried my best to hide my deep shock, but it was hard to restrain my madness and surprise at this supernatural pioneering work of mankind. This is really a crazy scientific myth, and I feel like I'm going crazy.

Nowadays, water and sediment regulation, as an epoch-making key technology for human beings to control the Yellow River, has entered the conventional application from the experimental stage. It is a scientific myth, but it is no longer crazy, but just makes people feel wonderful and magical. This is actually a realm of harmony between man and nature created by human water conservancy and natural rivers under a high degree of tacit understanding. The design of human beings does not violate the natural nature of rivers, but follows their natural laws and guides them according to the situation. By the end of 20 10, human beings have used the Xiaolangdi, the life gate of the Yellow River, to scour and deposit the riverbed in the lower reaches of the Yellow River with artificial floods. After 10 years of erosion, the deterioration trend of the lower Yellow River bed has not only been contained, but also decreased year by year. The downstream rivers are generally brushed 30 to 40 cm deep. With the deepening of the river course, the water capacity of the main river course has more than doubled. The reduction of sediment deposition means the reduction of flood threat and the improvement of flood control standard. How much has it improved? Mr. Hu, a famous flood control expert of the Yellow River Conservancy Committee, told me a direct answer: the flood control standard of the lower reaches of the Yellow River has been raised from once in 60 years to once in a thousand years!

Huayuankou: Starting from Jiangjunba

If you want to see the nearest breach of the Yellow River, it is the Huayuankou in Zhengzhou.

Not to mention the well-known tragic Huayuankou incident here, Huayuankou is not only a historical rift, not only a submerged memory, but also a strong will of human beings to resist floods. A general dam makes me feel the strong will of human beings in the most direct way, while a big river is always full of rebellious enthusiasm. This is an indestructible dam. It is said to be the unparalleled dam head on the Yellow River in Wan Li. I chose to start with the General Dam, and I also used the most direct way to see the standardized levee at Huayuankou, which is said to be stronger than the General Dam.

At present, this native and dark-faced Yellow River man is Li Changqun, director of Huijin River Bureau.

Speaking of it, his life experience, his life experience, is also a kind of life experience and experience of the Yellow River. His father is the first generation of Yellow Emperor in New China, and he is an old model worker. 1979 After graduating from high school, Li Changqun was recruited into the Yellow River Committee system. His first job was as a sailor in a shipping company. Their boat was pulled by Liu Deng's army when crossing the Yellow River, and was later transferred to the Yellow River Committee system to pull stones for flood fighting and emergency rescue. Since then, dangerous workers in the Yellow River have built stone dams. The boatmen not only pull stones, but also carry them on their backs. Everyone in that generation of Yellow River really suffered a lot. A stone weighs several hundred kilograms and is uneven all over. In order to resist the sharp edges and corners of the stone, everyone put a board on his back, then two people lifted a big stone and pressed it on his back, bent down, walked through the rickety springboard step by step and carried it back to the dam head. An old boatman like his father has two fist-sized pimples on his back, which are harder than stones. They came out with their fists against their waist when they worked hard, which is a brand that they will never erase in their lives. In case of flood, these boats are also lifeboats. Sailors shouted in the turbulent and turbid waves, and searched for fellow villagers struggling in the flood. They were trapped on branches and roofs by the flood and rescued them to the ship. If the boat can't cross, the sailors will jump into the water to save people. Many boatmen have already died. ...

Lao Li's tone is very calm. It was once the sea was difficult to calm the water, but I heard it thrilling.

Lao Li doesn't seem to have much memory of the past history. He kept staring ahead.

Walking on this standardized levee, lush breath comes to my face, as if walking into the depths of the jungle. I even forgot the existence of the levee. It really doesn't look like a levee, but more like a tree-lined road. But Lao Li's words from time to time will make me come to my senses immediately, no matter how similar it is to the scenery, this is a dike. If the old dike in the old society is a dim and mottled black and white photo, then everything in front of us is like a three-dimensional multi-dimensional color video screen. This boulevard is actually the top of the standardized dike at Huayuankou, with a width of12m. Two rows of evergreen roadside forests are planted on both sides of the embankment, which are cedars. Standing at the top of the dam, they must bear the pressure of wind, rain and snow. Their vitality is also very strong, but in the past ten years, the branches and crowns on their heads have been densely connected. Walking under a tree is like walking through a green corridor, with no end in sight, only the mottled sunshine on the branches and leaves, which makes what I want to see clear and fuzzy.

Looking at the back side of the river, it is the silt back area, which is 100 meters wide. This is another pioneering work full of wisdom explored by ancient Chinese people in the process of river regulation-silting up the embankment. Speaking of the current silt back area project, Lao Li showed an unbearable wry smile. The first-phase project of standardized dike construction of the Yellow River in Henan Province was piloted in Huijin River Bureau in July 2002. At that time, Lao Li was not the director, but only the project manager of a bid section. The projects he is responsible for include dikes and dangerous projects, but the most difficult one is the silt back area project. It's hard to say. The hardest thing is not dealing with muddy water, but dealing with people. It turns out that many fish ponds outside the levee will be buried by the silt back area project. Of course, in order to compensate the villagers, they have been informed in advance to fish. Some fellow villagers are easy to talk to, but when they meet individual village tyrants, nothing makes sense. You reason with him, he comes with you, stops there with a long knife, and you are not allowed to construct. It's no use being afraid of Lao Li. A village bully put a knife rest around his neck, and Lao Li commanded the construction without blinking an eye. One night, about 1 pm, it was raining. A group of people suddenly surrounded Lao Li's workshop. In the dark, Lao Li was awakened by a strange sound. When he opened his eyes, he saw several bright flashes of lightning on the glass window. He thought it was really lightning. He went to the window and found that it was a few shadows, with electric batons in their hands, banging on the iron-framed glass door. This is not just what happened to Lao Li alone and in a work area. Many work areas suffered, and many people were really scared away. But Lao Li didn't scare away. At this time, your only way is to open the door and face it frankly. ...

The standardized dike project in Huijin section of the Yellow River started in July last year and was completed in April 2003. Only half a year. Despite all the hardships, Lao Li still feels particularly lucky. This is a section of the levee in the lower reaches of the Yellow River, and it is also the opening work of standardized levee construction in the lower reaches of the Yellow River. He not only witnessed the birth of the strongest and largest Yellow River levee in history, but also participated in history. From the completion of the standardized local pilot project in Huayuankou to the end of 2004, the standardized dikes in Zhengzhou, Kaifeng and Jinan were built one after another, and the Yellow River levee extended to the sea with unprecedented grandeur. Looking at the Yellow River from such an embankment, a world-famous suspended river no longer looks like a huge suspense, but more like an "underground river" with water flowing downwards.

I have been thinking all the way, what is the standard of standardized dikes? Seeing this, I understand that it is not just a simple dike, but a trinity standardized dike system composed of "flood control guarantee line, flood control traffic line and ecological landscape line", which not only provides a solid flood control barrier for the Yellow River, but also an ecological barrier along the Yellow River. Embankment is the product of disasters and troubles. It has never been a landscape, and it is hard to become a landscape. However, every detail of the Yellow River levee in front of us embodies a kind of perfectionism in the bones of contemporary people who manage the Yellow River. There is great beauty only when there is great enlightenment, and there is a great realm of harmony between man and nature. I even think it is the most magnificent work in the history of human dikes so far, and it is a double embodiment of beauty and strength. But my colleague Li Changqun doesn't seem as optimistic as I thought. He had a premonition of disaster. There has been no flood in the Yellow River basin for more than 30 years. According to the hydrological cycle law of the Yellow River, the probability of a major flood is increasing. An uncertain and unpredictable disaster, I don't know when it will come, but it may come at any time.

A Yellow River, like a taut bowstring, never slackens.

Yellow River Beach: Where is the road?

If I want to make a survey on the marginal living conditions in China, the Yellow River Beach must be my first choice.

Wherever this river goes, man will follow it. People are not vegetation, but they also have the nature of being born of water. The Yellow River Beach I want to go to is not the river, but the river, even the center of the river, which is also the edge of human existence. I began to notice its existence, which was related to an unexpected disaster.

It was a disaster that many people repeatedly told me, the flood caused by the autumn rain in West China in 2003.

The Yellow River is in an emergency, and the most dangerous place is Lankao. What was the traffic in Lankao at that time? Less than two thousand!

According to the general fortification standard for flood control of the Yellow River, the reach of the Yellow River in the worst-hit areas such as Lankao, Henan and Dongming, Shandong, is enough to resist 10 times more floods than this "flood". In other words, the "flood" flooding the lower reaches of the Yellow River is only one tenth of the designed flood control standard. Strangely, so little water has caused another flood in the 60 years of human rule over the Yellow River. To put it bluntly, it's not surprising. When I interviewed Mr. Hu, an expert on flood control in the Yellow River, he gave me an example that even children can understand: The Yellow River used to hold a basin of water, but now it can only hold a bowl of water, even if the shallow water at the bottom of the basin is poured into the bowl, it will overflow. In this way, we can understand why a flood that is not a flood at all can bring unexpected disasters to the lower reaches of the Yellow River.

In the crisis of flooding, an explosive news began to spread: the Yellow River burst and Lankao dam broke!

If the news is true, it will be the first time in the history of new China.

But as soon as Mr. Hu heard the news, he immediately concluded-fake news!

The breach is true, but the reporter who reported it misunderstood that it is not a Yellow River levee, but a production levee in Caiji, Gu Ying Township, lankao county. The dam explosion is also true, and it is also a production dam that hinders the flood discharge of the Yellow River levee. Although there was no catastrophe, for the safety of people's lives and property in the beach area, Xiaolangdi closed the floodgate on1October 26th 14: 30 and suspended flood discharge for 100 hour. As all the floods in the upper reaches of Xiaolangdi were intercepted, the water level in the lower reaches of the Yellow River began to drop sharply. In this life-and-death 100 hour, the Caijisheng levee in Gu Ying Township burst in 4 1 day and finally successfully closed the dragon. If there is no Xiaolangdi, later statistics show that this "small flood disaster" that should not have happened has brought more than 654.38+000 billion direct economic losses to the lower reaches of the Yellow River.

When the off-road vehicle drove into the deeper beach area, I felt more and more that the reporter who was punished for creating a shocking "fake news" was a little wronged. If you don't stay awake, you don't even know that you have entered the Yellow River Beach. In the long dust rolled up by the wheels, there is no Yellow River levee at all. In this area, the dams on both banks are more than 20 kilometers apart. How far can a person see? Compared with those creatures in nature, human eyes are very short-sighted. Walking on this river, what you see is not a river, nor a beach or riverbed, as if it were still a part of the Central Plains. However, this is the river-the road of the river, which is true. This is the nearest place to the Yellow River, even the heart of the Yellow River, but the main channel of the Yellow River is only a few hundred meters wide. On the beach where there is no edge, the river is still so far away from me. I can hardly see or even smell the water along the way. I can only see many small dams built by human beings. These small dams are often called production dikes, vegetable dikes or beach protection dikes. In the ancient river records, it is generally called People's County. In the history of harnessing the Yellow River in New China, the understanding of the Yellow River floodplain has been repeated several times. At the beginning of the founding of New China, the reclamation of the beach area was once prohibited by the state because the villages and production dikes in the beach area hindered the flood discharge of the Yellow River. However, with the rapid increase of population in the lower reaches of the Yellow River, the Central Plains was originally sparsely populated. Seeing the fertile land in the beach area, the strong impulse along the Yellow River could not be suppressed. Especially after the flood of 1958, another disaster has not passed. At that time, during the Great Leap Forward, human beings were overhauling the production levees on the Yellow River beach and reclaiming land on a large scale. The Yellow River beach area once made countless people proud as a "granary in the world". However, the Yellow River is not always a mother's heart. When mankind pushes the way out narrower and narrower, it will inevitably bring disasters to mankind again and again.

Every flood season, from the Yellow River Committee and the Yellow River Defense General to the local governments on both sides of the Yellow River, people are very nervous. It's already late autumn, and it's not far from the first frost, but Qin Zhiqiang, director of Gu Ying Town Flood Control Office, still runs around the beach every day. I met him by chance during an interview with Li Men Village, Gu Ying Township, the Yellow River beach area. But when I asked about the flood season this year, he stared at me and said, "The Yellow River is so strange. You never know when it will flood. In the flood season, we must always be vigilant. " In the event of a flood, Qin Zhiqiang, director of the most basic flood control office, must first ensure that "the village will be notified in 20 minutes and the villagers will be notified in 20 minutes!"

Then, where will the villagers in these beaches move before the flood comes? Shen Liugui, the village director, showed me a card for moving an ambulance. This card is big red, and it is uniformly printed by Henan Anti-Finger. The card filled in the population of temporary relocated households, the number of houses and valuables, the distance and route from the relocated village to the resettlement village and other related information. Before the flood season every year, whether there is flood or not, the Yellow River beach area will hold Qian 'an emergency drill. Taking Li Men Village as an example, such drills were conducted simultaneously in Li Men Village and Zhangji Village in the west of the relocation village. Before the drill, a comprehensive mobilization was carried out, and Qian 'an rescue drill command center was established. At the beginning of the drill, water personnel released water information, and village cadres immediately organized villagers to gather quickly after receiving the water information. At one order, the participants took the Qian 'an ambulance card and made an emergency transfer to Zhangji Village in the west of the village. The militia on duty wore camouflage uniforms and armbands and stood guard along the line. Public security personnel maintain traffic order around the exercise area, and medical staff set up temporary rescue points to prepare for first aid. Along the way, the transferred men, women and children were carrying baskets in backpacks, pulling cows and sheep, and lined up to their destinations. There are also various means of transportation, such as carriages, tractors, electric tricycles, tool carts and trucks, which are numbered, released by police cars and escorted by ambulances. In the process of evacuation, it is also necessary to simulate the response measures under special circumstances such as communication interruption, traffic interruption and vehicle troubleshooting in flood. Such a drill was completed within one hour, and all aspects of immigration, rescue and resettlement were interlocking and orderly. If there really is a flood, this realistic drill is actual combat.

But in the final analysis, these measures are only temporary hemostasis. An autumn rain in West China pushed the fate of beach people to the world again. 10 years, this long and narrow Yellow River beach is still a thorn inserted in the chest of the Yellow River. It hurts, hurts and bleeds, but it is human beings who hurt and bleed.

Yellow River Beach, where is the road? Over the years, the Yellow River Committee has been actively striving for compensation after floods and a series of policies to benefit the people. At present, the state has issued a compensation policy for the beach area, and the water avoidance guarantee project in the beach area is being further strengthened and reformed. But there is also the most direct and fundamental way to get people out of the embarrassing living state in the beach area, that is, to transfer people from the beach area to the outside of the beach and return the river to the river, so as to face both the flood and the embarrassing situation of human beings fighting on both sides in flood control. However, it is not easy to move nearly 2 million people out. The total number of immigrants in the Three Gorges is only 1 10,000, and the total population of immigrants in the beach area is almost twice that of the Three Gorges. In the densely populated Huang-Huai-Hai Plain, there is hardly an inch of extra land, so it is really difficult to move so many immigrants out. But no matter how difficult it is, nearly 2 million people in the beach area must move out, and the local government is also solving it in stages. However, it is conceivable that it is not a matter of time to move them all away.

Compared with Li Men Village, Jianzhuang, which belongs to Gu Ying Township, is lucky. This is a new immigrant village that moved out of the beach area a few years ago and was built according to the new rural standards. Listen to the villagers here, Jianzhuang, originally called Jianzhuang. Many people know Lankao because of Jiao Youlu, and also know the sandstorm, flood, waterlogging and saline-alkali land in Lankao. There are many villages called alkali villages on the Yellow River beach, and there are frosty and glistening saline-alkali land everywhere. Many people's ancestors used to cook salt and alkali on the Yellow River beach.

I can't see the thrifty village or the alkali village on the Yellow River beach, which is its past life, and the thrifty village I see is its present life. The street in the village is a cement road paved with street lights. At first glance, it really looks like the street of a town. On both sides of the village street, there are two or three-story buildings. Unlike the countryside, it looks like a street community. But as soon as I saw the corn cob hanging in the street in this village, the illusion of urbanization disappeared immediately. However, the wealth here is not an illusion. Motorcycles, electric cars, agricultural vehicles and cars are parked at the door of every household. I counted it at random, and there were more than 10. This makes me suddenly feel that a village moving from the Yellow River Beach here is not only a time-space displacement, but also a simple change of attitude, but a new way of life, which may have a subtle influence on the local consciousness, spirit and culture of the people here. Other things aside, one thing is certain. With the strong protection of the levee, people here at least no longer have that kind of jittery and precarious anxiety and fear.

Here comes a big man who looks very young. I went over to talk to him. The man surnamed Zhang is 54 years old this year. Unexpectedly, as soon as he opened his mouth, he poured bitter water on me: after moving to this new village, the house was small, there was no threshing floor, and the field was far away, and I was asked to plant more than ten miles away. Also, his son has long been married and has not been assigned to the homestead. He is almost 30 years old and can't set up a door yet ... He is telling the truth. I listened thoughtfully and suddenly asked him in surprise, would you like to move back? This is my usual trick. A direct, simple and sudden question often makes a person instinctively tell the truth before thinking. His first reaction was to shake his head hard. Well, it's really not a place for people to live. Every flood season, I can't sleep well. There are two disasters every three years, either drought or waterlogging. Even if there is no disaster, the village is full of garbage, chicken manure and firewood piles. How nice it is here! We will live more and more like city people. As long as the Yellow River levee does not fall, as long as you don't jump into the Yellow River helplessly, no matter how big the flood is. ...

I believe this is the heartfelt words of a fellow villager in the beach area. I also know that in such a village, even if he moves back, he is not used to living like that again. It seems that he is still unaccustomed, stiff, clumsy and even morbid to watch him dragging his legs step by step in a village street. I subconsciously thought that the road under his feet may not be a perfect road, but it is indeed the best one under the beach area.