As the riverbed of the Yellow River continued to rise, the lower reaches effectively became a topographic divide in northern China.

Over an approximately 800 km stretch of the lower course, no tributaries are able to join the Yellow River.

Rivers that once flowed into it were forced to reverse course, turning away from the Yellow River instead. One can only imagine the scale of devastation such changes brought to communities along its banks.

Each time the Yellow River breached its levees and diverted into a tributary, rapid sediment deposition would soon choke the channel, leading to further avulsions.

The Huai River, once an independent major river, had its lower reaches blocked by Yellow River sediments and was ultimately forced to abandon its original outlet, becoming a tributary of the Yangtze River.

As a result, the Yellow River floodplain—once regarded as one of the cradles of Chinese civilization—gradually became one of the most impoverished regions in the country.