Wadi Mujeb / Mujeb Dam

MUJEB DAM

Located in Wadi Mujib, between the cities of Madaba and Karak, in the Madaba Governorate of Jordan. It is a rolled concrete dam with abutments of clay-core rockfill completed in 2004, after six years of construction. Highway 35, part of the historic King’s Highway, crosses the crest. The water it impounds is combined with desalinated water piped from brackish wells along the Dead Sea to the west in a reservoir holding 35 million m3 (1 billion US gallons) which primarily supplies Amman, 100 kilometers (62 mi) to the north helping to ease a very stressed national water supply.

The Mujib Biosphere Reserve is the lowest nature reserve in the world, with a spectacular array of scenery near the east coast of the Dead Sea. The Reserve is located within the deep Wadi Mujib gorge, which enters the Dead Sea at 410m below sea level.
The Reserve extends to the Karak and Madaba mountains to the north and south, reaching 900 metres above sea level in some places. This 1,300m variation in elevation, combined with the valley’s year- round water flow from seven tributaries, means that Wadi Mujib enjoys a magnificent bio-diversity that is still being explored and documented today.
Over 300 species of plants, 10 species of carnivores and numerous species of permanent and migratory birds have been recorded. Some of the remote mountain and valley areas are difficult to reach, and thus offer safe havens for rare species of cats, goats and other mountain animals. Mujib’s sandstone cliffs are an ideal habitat for one of the most beautiful mountain goats in the world, the horned Ibex.