Water: a vital resource in crisis

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Aly Song/Reuters

A child cools off from hot weather in a fountain at People's Square in Shanghai, August 7, 2013.

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Laszlo Balogh/Reuters

A Roma girl fills up a plastic bottle from a public well at the impoverished outskirts of Ozd, northeastern Hungary, 96 miles from Budapest, August 7, 2013. Ozd's municipal government restricted water access in June and tensions ran high as a heat wave grips Hungary in August, with temperatures near record highs at around 104 degrees Fahrenheit.

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Reuters

A farmer walks past a dried-up pond in Yunnan province, China, in February 2013. China's drought relief authority said that about 600,000 people are facing a shortage of drinking water amid a severe drought for the fourth straight year.

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Susan Montoya Bryan/AP

US Fish and Wildlife Service biologists Tristan Austring (l.) and Angela James use a seine net to search for endangered Rio Grande silvery minnow in isolated pools in the riverbed near Socorro, N.M., in June 2013. Biologists point to a combination of persistent drought and demands on the river as the cause.

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Athit Perawongmetha/Reuters

A Thai soldier in a white biohazard suit drinks water as he participates in a clean-up operation at Ao Prao Beach, Rayong, Thailand, July 30, 2013. About 50,000 liters of crude oil leaked from a pipeline and poured into the sea about 12 miles off the coast of Rayong.

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AP

People crowd into a saltwater swimming pool at a water park in Daying county, in southwestern China's Sichuan province on July 27, 2013.

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Melanie Stetson Freeman/Staff

Sherry Vargson's water from her kitchen faucett ignites due to methane migration into her well water which was polluted by fracking and natural gas drilling, in Granville Summit, Pa., in March 2012. Her family's farm lies within the Marcellus Shale region that has attracted oil companies to the area to extract rich reserves of natural gas through the controversial fracking process.

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Butch Comegys/The Scranton Times-Tribune/AP

Kaylee Wolf cools off at the Montage Mountain Water Park on July 17, 2013, in Scranton, Pa., in the middle of a long hot summer.

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Melanie Stetson Freeman/Staff

An aerial view of the sahel desert near Iriba, Chad, in July 2007 shows a dry wadi which will become a temporary river during the rainy season. Water is a constant problem in the desert, especially at the end of the dry season.

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Susan Montoya Bryan/AP

Our Lady of Sorrows Catholic Church parishioner Nick McGovern holding a rosary during a prayer procession for rain in Bernalillo, N.M., on April 19, 2013. From the heart of New Mexico to West Texas and Oklahoma, the pressures of drought have resulted in a resurgence of faith.

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Melanie Stetson Freeman/Staff

Ahmet Getin herds sheep on a dry lake bed in Tashkopru, Turkey, in November 2007. This village used to prosper on the edge of a big lake, but now the lake has gone dry and inhabitants are afraid it will never come back.

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Melanie Stetson Freeman/Staff

A Darfur refugee family loads their day's supply of water onto their donkey outside Touloum refugee camp in Chad in July 2007. Donkeys are invaluable to inhabitants of this barren land. About 23,000 refugees live in the camp.

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Nati Harnik/AP

A dry field of corn is seen near Fremont, Neb., in July 2012. The nation’s farm belt saw the worst of the year’s drought.

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Melanie Stetson Freeman/Staff

A little girl holds her family's water containers as they wait their turn to fill them in Kabul, Afghanistan, in April 2012. Squatter neighborhoods like this, built on the hillsides, do not have running water and many don't have electricity.

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George Novak/New Zealand Herald/AP

A resident surveys a flooded road in Mount Maunganui, Tauranga, New Zealand, April 22, 2013. New Zealand’s farmers are relieved that a deluge has ended the country’s most widespread drought in 30 years.

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Steph Langan/Bloomington Herald-Times/AP

A cow wears a fly mask at Triple H Wagyu farm near Bloomington, Ind., in June 2012. A mild winter combined with hot summer temperatures and drought conditions have increased the number of flies pestering area livestock.

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Eric Risberg/AP

Robert James of the California American Water company looks over water samples at a desalination plant in Sand City, Calif., in September 2012. Desalination plants are costing more to build than expected and are huge energy suckers.

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Melanie Stetson Freeman/Staff

A farm family moves their sprinklers to water more ground in Konya Basin, Turkey, in November 2007. Sprinklers are extremely inefficient since most of the water evaporates. Water in the Konya Basin is disappearing due to climate change and overuse.

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Seth Perlman/AP

Randy Grebke of Kohnen Concrete Products, demonstrates how he locates underground water by holding two copper wires while on a well drilling site in Huey, Ill., in August 2012. Many well drillers still witch or divine for water and are busier than ever.

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China Daily/Reuters

Soldiers use washbasins to irrigate a drought-hit wheat field on the outskirts of Xuchang, Henan province, China, in February 2009.

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Stefan Wermuth/Reuters

A man walks his dog after a fire affecting over 5 square miles of Dorset's Upton Heath was was brought under control in southwest England in June 2011. Parts of the East Anglia region were in a state of drought after the driest spring on record.

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Melanie Stetson Freeman/Staff

Dr. Gular Gocmez, a geologist and professor at Selcule University, talks to farmers about better water usage, like drip irrigation, in the Konya Basin, Turkey, in November 2007.

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Melanie Stetson Freeman/Staff

Girls pump water in their schoolyard in Kabul, Afghanistan, in April 2012. There is no running water in the school.

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Rebecca Blackwell/AP

Two-year-old, Aden Salaad is bathed in a tub at a Doctors Without Borders hospital where he is receiving treatment for malnutrition in Dagahaley Camp outside Dadaab, Kenya, in July 2011. He and his family escaped from drought-ridden Somalia.

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Tim Wimborne/Reuters

An Australian farmer and his dog muster sheep on his drought-affected farm near Cowra, Australia, in May 2005.

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Yusuf Ahmad/Reuters

A farmer waters vegetable plants on his paddy field in the Jeneponto district in Indonesia's South Sulawesi province in July 2011. Indonesia's government plans to import rice due to a long drought.

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Melanie Stetson Freeman/Staff

A donkey rests tied up to a leafless tree in Iridimi refugee camp in Chad in June 2007. The harsh climate of the sahel makes living difficult for the 17,000 refugees from Darfur who live in this camp.