China started a water capacity test on the Three Gorges reservoir Friday.

Approved by the Office of State Flood Control and Drought Relief Headquarters, the test will lift the reservoir's water level from 160.2 meters to its maximum 175 meters by the end of October, a spokeswoman from the State Council's Three Gorges Project Construction Committee Executive Office told Xinhua Friday.

The spokeswoman refused to provide further details about the test.

The 185-meter-deep reservoir on the Yangtze River, China's longest river, has a designed maximum water level of 175 meters.

(Xinhua News Agency September 10, 2010)