What is the largest freshwater lake on Earth? Many would immediately answer: Lake Baikal. But just how vast is it?
It has been estimated that a single drop of water entering this lake would take 400 years to flow out into a river. For four centuries, it would drift among the immense body of water, waiting to be swept away by the rushing Angara River and carried to the sea.
Lake Baikal holds one-tenth of the world’s freshwater found in all freshwater lakes combined. That’s quite an impressive figure. All the rivers on the planet would need 230 days to drain water from Baikal. And if the Angara were to attempt to empty this colossal lake, it would have to “work” non-stop from this year until 2361, without a moment’s rest.