LWRA - Largest World Rivers Award Series

The Largest World Rivers Award (LWRA) is dedicated to the 10th Anniversary of the European PSK Club. It has been sponsored by Radioarena UK Ltd and devised by the European PSK Club on 1st May, 2016 for two-way PSK contacts with amateur radio stations operating from banks of the largest world rivers longer than 1000 kilometres as per our table listed below. Contacted LWRA expeditions (stations) don't need to be members of the European PSK Club. This award series has no time or date restrictions.

LWRA 25, LWRA 50, LWRA 75, LWRA 100, LWRA 125 and LWRA 150 awards may be claimed by any licensed radio amateur, club station or DMS/SWL eligible under the EPC Awards General Rules who can produce evidence of having contacted 25, 50, 75, 100, 125 and 150 different rivers respectively at the time of application.

Please make sure that the «COMMENT» field in your ADIF log contains the contacted station's LWRA designator as per the list starting with a hash mark. For example ‒ if you made a QSO with a station working from Volga (Russia) your ADIF comment field should be #LWRA 017). This is a mandatory requirement to make able the manager's software to check your application correctly.

The operating station is counted for LRWA if its physical location (antenna and radio) is not farther than 1000 metres from the river channel

There are many factors, such as the source, the identification or the definition of the mouth, and the scale of measurement of the river length between source and mouth, that determine the precise meaning of river length. As a result, the length measurements of many rivers are only approximations.

For the purpose of determining maximum length a river's true source is considered to be the source of whichever tributary is farthest from the mouth. This tributary may or may not have the same name as the main stem river.

Furthermore, it is sometimes hard to state exactly where a river begins, especially rivers that are formed by ephemeral streams, swamps, or changing lakes. In this article, length means the length of the longest continuous river channel in a given river system, regardless of name.

The source of some rivers starting in farming areas can be difficult to determine, if the river is formed by the confluence of several farm field drainage ditches which only contain water after rain.

Similarly, in rivers starting in a chalk area, such as the Chilterns in south England, the length of the upper course which is dry varies with how high the water table is, which varies with the weather.

Even when detailed maps are available, the length measurement is not always clear. A river may have multiple channels, or anabranches. The length may depend on whether the center or the edge of the river is measured. It may not be clear how to measure the length through a lake. Seasonal and annual changes may alter both rivers and lakes. Other factors that can change the length of a river include cycles of erosion and flooding, dams, levees, and channelization. In addition, the length of meanders can change significantly over time due to natural or artificial cutoffs, when a new channel cuts across a narrow strip of land, bypassing a large river bend. For example, due to 18 cutoffs created between 1766 and 1885 the length of the Mississippi River from Cairo, Illinois, to New Orleans, Louisiana, was reduced by 351 km.

These points make it difficult, if not impossible, to get an accurate measurement of the length of a river. The varying accuracy and precision also makes it difficult to make length comparisons between different rivers without a degree of uncertainty.

LWRA LIST OF RIVERS LONGER THAN 1000 KM

One should take the aforementioned discussion into account when using the data in the following table. For most rivers, different sources provide conflicting information on the length of a river system. The information in different sources is between parentheses.