Riverbed hand-dug wells
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These are shallow wells which draw water from a natural or man-made aquifer specifically within a riverbed. The simplest version of these is a shallow hole dug every season in a riverbed which gets flooded with every flood event. Other versions allow the water to be accessed all year round through offset handpumps.
Suitable conditions
- Wells need to be sited in riverbeds that are dry for part of the year, allowing construction to take place.
- There should be water remaining in the riverbed throughout the dry season.
- Where wells are dug with the intention to abstract water using manual or motorized suction pumps, due to pumping requirements it is best to site these wells:
- Within 30 metres of the pump location.
- In areas where there are no high banks and where maximum floodwater height is lower than these banks – this is so that suction pumps can still operate (effectively will abstract water between 6 – 7 metres height).