Óbidos, Pará

Óbidos
Municipio
The Municipality of Óbidos
Flag Seal
Location in the State of Pará
Country	Brazil
Region	Northeast
State	Pará
Founded	September 23, 1867
Government
• Mayor	Jaime Barbosa da Silva(PTB)
Area
• Total	28,021.287 km^2 (10,819.079 sq mi)
Population (2010)
• Total	49,254
• Density	1.76/km^2 (4.6/sq mi)
Time zone	UTC-3 (UTC-3)

Óbidos is a municipality in Pará, Brazil located at the narrowest and swiftest part of the Amazon River. It's an old town founded in 1697, and located between Santarém and Oriximiná. The town is the seat of the Diocese of Óbidos. The town was named after Óbidos, Portugal.

Conservation

The north of the municipality contains part (7.36%) of the 4,245,819 hectares (10,491,650 acres) Grão-Pará Ecological Station, the largest fully protected tropical forest conservation unit on the planet.^[1] It contains 10% of the 3,172,978 hectares (7,840,600 acres) Trombetas State Forest, created in 2006.^[2]

Sobral Santos II disaster

Óbidos was the scene of the sinking of the Sobral Santos II in September 1981, one of the worst maritime tragedies in the history of the Amazon River. The riverboat was making its weekly trip between Santarém and Manaus and was claimed to be overcrowded when it sank in Óbidos harbour.^[3] It is assumed over 300 people died in the disaster, with hundreds of bodies and body parts never identified. In 2014, British angler Jeremy Wade went to Óbidos to investigate the role that local fish species may have played in the loss of life during this disaster; his findings were documented in the River Monsters episode entitled "Amazon Apocalypse." ^[4]

References

1. Estação Ecológica Grão-Pará (in Portuguese), Ideflor-bio (Government of Pará), retrieved 2016-05-12
2. FES do Trombetas (in Portuguese), ISA: Instituto Socioambiental, retrieved 2016-09-07
3. 300 DIE AS AMAZON BOAT SINKS - New York Times
4. ‘River Monsters’ uncovers tale of deadly Amazon fish attack - New York Post

Further reading

• Harris, Mark. Life on the Amazon The Anthropology of a Brazilian Peasant Village. A British Academy postdoctoral fellowship monograph. Oxford: Published for the British Academy by Oxford University Press, 2000. ISBN 0-19-726239-2

• Columbia-Lippincott guide'. (New York City: Columbia University Press, 1952) p. 1362.

Coordinates: 1°54′S 55°31′W / 1.900°S 55.517°W