Europe’s summer of extreme heat and drought has pushed some of its rivers to record lows, revealing long-submerged relics from ancient bones to century-old shipwrecks.

Ancient Discoveries

The remains of what’s believed to be an ancient mammoth were discovered on the newly exposed riverbed of the Danube in northern Bulgaria, after the river plunged to record lows.

The Danube also runs through Croatia, where receding water has revealed the skeleton of a cargo ship called the Fulton, which was transporting coal down the river when it sank in 1937.

In Serbia, the shrunken river has exposed the remains of a sunken Nazi warship.

Climate Crisis

This summer, Europe has been roiled by a succession of extreme, record-breaking heat waves, which scientists are clear have been made more intense by the human-driven climate crisis.

The hot, dry weather has primed the land for the destructive wildfires sweeping through the continent, and it’s also putting immense pressure on its water sources.

Gushing rivers have shrunk to a trickle, vast tracts of desiccated riverbed now lie exposed, and the crisis is affecting everything from shipping and tourism to water availability and energy generation.

Energy Crisis

Parts of the Danube, Europe’s second-largest river which winds through 10 countries, have shrunk to unprecedented lows.

In Budapest, the capital of Hungary, the national water authority measured a water level in the Danube of 9 inches on Wednesday, shattering the previous record low of 13 inches set in 2013.

Hungary is set to close a nuclear plant that produces nearly half the country’s electricity, potentially for weeks, due to the record-low water level of the Danube.

Original reporting: KEYT (Ventura/Santa Barbara) — read the source article.