A hiker posted a video showing the water flow of the fall was coming from a pipe built into the rock face.

A controversy over a waterfall has cascaded into a social media storm in China, even prompting an explanation from the water body itself.

A hiker posted a video that showed the flow of water from Yuntai Mountain Waterfall - billed as China’s tallest uninterrupted waterfall - was coming from a pipe built high into the rock face.

The clip has been liked more than 70,000 times since it was first posted on Monday. Operators of the Yuntai tourism park said that they made the “small enhancement” during the dry season so visitors would feel that their trip had been worthwhile.

“The one about how I went through all the hardship to the source of Yuntai Waterfall only to see a pipe,” the caption of the video posted by user “Farisvov” reads.

  • conditional_soupEnglish
    6521·
    5 months ago

    This doesn’t seem all that awful to me. The waterfall isn’t fake, it’s just something they do in the dry season so visitors don’t feel like they wasted a trip. It’s not the choice I would make if I were running the park, but it doesn’t seem that bad to me.

    • Kecessa@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      976·
      5 months ago

      If you go check a waterfall in the dry season and expect it to be pouring water like it was monsoon season, you deserve to be disappointed.

      • conditional_soupEnglish
        337·
        5 months ago

        I tend to agree with you, nature should be experienced as-is, imo. I just don’t think this is that terrible.

    • AbouBenAdhem@lemmy.worldEnglish
      406·
      5 months ago

      It can mislead visitors about the severity of climate change… and it can impact the local ecosystem, if there are organisms around the waterfall that depend on there being a dry season each year.

      • Blóðbók@slrpnk.netEnglish
        61·
        5 months ago

        If it is dry due to climate change I don’t see how there is an eco-system built around the drought worth preserving.

        • AbouBenAdhem@lemmy.worldEnglish
          10·
          5 months ago

          Most likely the dry season is naturally occurring, but the length and severity are affected by climate change.

    • chiliedogg@lemmy.worldEnglish
      6·
      5 months ago

      When I was I Niagara they did the opposite. They’d divert water into pipes bypassing the falls and “turn down” the falls at night.

    • antlion@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
      2·
      5 months ago

      There’s already a dam at Hetch Hetchy. All they need now is some pumps and pipes to bring more tourists to Yosemite Valley in Summer.

      • conditional_soupEnglish
        2·
        5 months ago

        I work near Yosemite, we don’t need one extra body there in the summer at all.