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Turkey Turkey Waterfall

Tortum Waterfall

A 48 m drop.

When to go

Tortum Waterfall (2)
Jaba1977 · CC BY-SA 4.0

In numbers.

48m

Height

8.7m³/s

Average flow

estimate

Mar–Jun

Best months

4.1MW

Water power

estimate

The water at Tortum Waterfall, month by month

It roars from March to May.

The fullest months: from March to May, with the snowmelt.

  1. 6.3 m³/sJan
  2. 8.1 m³/sFeb
  3. 38 m³/sMar
  4. 37 m³/sApr
  5. 33 m³/sMay
  6. 20 m³/sJun
  7. 7.1 m³/sJul
  8. 1.7 m³/sAug
  9. 7.5 m³/sSep
  10. 17 m³/sOct
  11. 13 m³/sNov
  12. 12 m³/sDec
high water best months to go

From about 1.7 m³/s in the lowest month to 38 m³/s in the highest. Best months to go, with plenty of water and pleasant days: from March to June.

Estimate: the timing comes from rain, snowmelt and evaporation (NASA POWER, 1991–2020); the amounts from the river model of HydroATLAS (WaterGAP, 1971–2000). Dams upstream can change the real flow.

Waterfall

Tortum Waterfall is a waterfall in Turkey. The water falls 48 m over a front 22 m wide.

Read more on Wikipedia

Getting there.

  • Kılıçkayanearest town · 17 km in a straight line
  • Parking 90 m awaynearest car park in OpenStreetMap, straight line
  • Erzurum International Airport (ERZ)nearest airport with scheduled flights · 89 km in a straight lineCar hire at BUS airport (Batumi)Discover Cars · Affiliate link
  • From March to Junebest months to go (estimate)

Plan your visit

Stay, explore and get there

Some links above are affiliate links: if you book through them we may earn a commission, at no extra cost to you. It never changes what the data on this page says.

How big is it?

How big it really is.

48 mTortumWaterfall1.8 ma person9.0 ma house56 mTower of Pisa

Height of the drop from Wikidata. Buildings and the person are drawn at the same scale.

4.1 MW

About 8.7 m³/s falling 48 m: the power of the water as it drops.

  • as much as 1.4 large wind turbines
  • enough to power about 1,000 homes, if it were all turned into electricity

Power of falling water = density × gravity × flow × height. Average flow and height as shown above; an estimate.

Seen from the sky.

8 × 8 km of cloud-free satellite image, with what OpenStreetMap knows around the falls.

Tortum Waterfall seen from above (Sentinel-2) N 2 km

Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 (EOX, CC BY 4.0), 8 × 8 km, north up. Points © OpenStreetMap contributors.

The Tortum Çayı through the falls
800 m900 m1,000 mTortum Waterfall-1 km-0.5 km0+0.5 km+1 km+1.5 km← upstreamdownstream →

The line follows the river as mapped in OpenStreetMap; heights from the 30 m Copernicus model, which smooths narrow drops — the published height of the falls is the one above.

The valley below the falls
−690 m+690 m

Around the falls the river drops 195 m in 3.0 km.

What is around.

  • 1viewpoints
  • —waymarked walking routes
  • 1car parks
  • —swimming spots
  • 1picnic sites
  • —toilets
  • —information boards and visitor centres
  • —bus stops within 1 km
  • —other named waterfalls within 4 km
  • —caves
  • 1campsitesKAMP ALANI
  • —hotels, B&Bs and huts within 6 km
  • 2restaurants and cafés within 3 km

Counted in OpenStreetMap, the map anyone can edit, up to 2 km around the falls (unless noted). A low number may just mean nobody has mapped it yet. © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL).

Towns nearby

  • Kılıçkaya17 km in a straight line
  • Uzundere18 km in a straight line
  • Yusufeli21 km in a straight line

Weather

The weather, month by month.

JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Afternoon °C351016222630312620115
Night °C-9-704101416171381-6
Rain & snow (mm)615161687668535270907366
Wet days12111213151311910121111
Sun h/day5.77.77.66.87.610.010.610.19.16.55.04.9
Snow on the ground (cm)333718113000051523

Long-term averages 1991–2020 (NASA POWER) for a cell about 55 km wide, with temperatures carried to the height of the falls (1,001 m) at −6.5 °C per 1,000 m. Not a forecast.

Photos

Through visitors' eyes.

Tortum Waterfall (1)
Jaba1977 · CC BY-SA 4.0
Tortum Waterfall 2
Ebrarstascii · CC BY-SA 4.0
Tortum Waterfall Erzurum
Ebrarstascii · CC BY-SA 4.0

Recent years

Wet years and dry years

Rain of each month as a share of the 1991–2020 average. A wet season above 100 % usually means a fuller waterfall.

JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
2020125%148%81%99%136%68%110%96%52%27%91%69%
202187%86%146%40%31%35%108%82%135%112%55%88%
2022125%40%127%59%109%129%24%23%98%91%57%66%
202360%187%176%146%98%138%153%43%57%96%200%102%
2024172%97%120%22%140%67%251%72%111%149%133%115%
202574%151%106%136%102%53%70%35%154%90%9%150%

130% wetter than usual 70% drier than usual

Compare with the waterfalls nearby.

Tortum Waterfall

Turkey

  • 48 mHeight
  • 8.7 m³/sAverage flow
  • Mar–JunBest months

Gelintülü Waterfall

Turkey

  • —Height
  • 3.4 m³/sAverage flow
  • Apr–May, Oct–NovBest months

See the guide

Mençuna Waterfall

Turkey

  • 80 mHeight
  • —Average flow
  • Mar, Oct–DecBest months

See the guide

Palovit Waterfall

Turkey

  • —Height
  • 2.1 m³/sAverage flow
  • Mar–Apr, Oct–NovBest months

See the guide

About these numbers

Names, height, width, riverWikidata (Q1337971) · CC0
River flow and catchmentHydroATLAS / RiverATLAS v1.0 (Linke et al. 2019) · CC BY 4.0
ClimateNASA POWER, 1991–2020
Relief, river profile, 3D modelCopernicus DEM GLO-30 · © DLR e.V., © Airbus Defence and Space GmbH, Copernicus/ESA
Paths, viewpoints, parking© OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL
ImagesEOX Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 · CC BY 4.0; Wikimedia Commons

Every figure is an average, an estimate or a count from a public dataset. Licences and methods: data sources.

The family

Do you prefer beaches, lakes, mountains, waterfalls, islands, rivers or canyons?

Same idea, other landscapes: field atlases built on open data, month by month, in seven languages.