April 18, 2015 - EARTH - The following list constitutes the latest reports of high tides, heavy
rainfall, flash floods, widespread flooding, sea level rise and
catastrophic storms.
At least 4 passengers dead after bus is swept away by floods near Mandera, Kenya
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| Passengers atop a bus that was swept away by flash
floods as it tried to cross a seasonal river at Gadudia in Mandera
County on April 16, 2015. |
At least four passengers were killed while more than 20 remained unaccounted for after floods swept away a bus in Mandera on Thursday.
County Commissioner Alex ole Nkoyo, who confirmed the four deaths, said
rescuers were still searching for more bodies along the river where the
incident occurred.
The bus, Mr Nkoyo said, had 59 passengers with an unknown number of
children when it was rummaged by the fierce waters. Only 42 passengers
had been rescued by around 5pm, Mr Nkoyo said.
There were fears that the number of those killed following the
floods could rise as signs of more passengers being rescued faded as
darkness neared.
"We had the police escort but their vehicle had already crossed
the Gadudia seasonal river in which the bus stalled before it flooded,"
said Mr Nkoyo. The bus was traveling from Mandera to Nairobi.
Scores of passengers were washed away as others climbed on top of the bus to save their lives.
Mandera Kenya Red Cross Society coordinator Ahmed Mohamed also said 42
passengers who were in the bus as it tried to cross the river had been
rescued by 2pm.
Mr Mohamed said the rescue operation was under way and involved the KRSC, the military and other government organs.
"We will brief you as the operation continues. It is ongoing. We will confirm the whereabouts of the rest," he said.
The KRCS official said the bus, which overturned after being rummaged by
the floods, had been removed from the waters and turned over.
The bus got stuck in the mud before it was swept away by floods along with its passengers.
Mandera Town
"Several people have been carried away but the rest are on top of the
bus after coming out through the windows," Mr Nkoyo had said earlier.
"The water level is coming down and we have formed a human wall to help
rescue those on the bus and those who might have drowned," he added.
The incident occurred 35 kilometres from Mandera Town.
The bus was said to be the only one from Mandera that was heading to
Nairobi as other bus companies kept off the roads due to heavy rains.
Chile Faces $1.5 Billion Costs of Flood Damage
Chile
is now facing costs of around $1.5 billion in construction costs and
economic reactivation in the flood-hit north of the country. But based
on preliminary analysis, Fitch Ratings believes that insurance industry
solvency will not be affected.
In their statement of 14 April,
Fitch said it believes that insurance industry solvency will not be
affected by the recent floods in northern Chile (second and third
region). The Chilean property/casualty insurance industry will
adequately absorb the incurred claims and will result in a limited
effect in 2015 fiscal year net income.
Fitch say that, compared to
Chile’s 2010 earthquake, geographical extent and population density of
the flood-affected area is more limited. Meanwhile, the Chilean
insurance industry has solid risk coverage, which besides strong
underwriting policies, includes solid reinsurance protection for
retained risks and catastrophic events.
“The agency considers
unlikely an impact on the insurers’ solvency and ratings due to the
limited effect in net loss ratios, which mainly will be derived from
infrastructure damage, roads, commercial buildings and housing claims”.
Damage and Costs
Fitch
say that the largest impact of the catastrophe will be on industrial
infrastructure, considering the importance of the mining operations in
the area, housing, public buildings, commercial infrastructure and to a
lesser extent damage to vehicles. Over
2,000 homes were destroyed and over 6,000 damaged in the floods.
Difficulties
in collecting damage information have delayed estimates of the economic
costs of the disaster, and therefore also estimations of claims cost
that insurers face locally. The Chilean government has estimated the
construction costs and economic reactivation in the area at
approximately $1.5 billion USD.
Grape and Olive Production
Despite
promises of financial help for flood hit farmers,
the effects of the flood disaster, particularly in the Copiapo Valley,
are expected to result in be felt in decreased table grape output in
future seasons.
In a recent statement, Copiapo Valley Agricultural
Producers and Exporters Association (APECO) president Lina Arrieta
said, “Making a preliminary estimate, it seems as though the table grape
production will be reduced by at least 30% over the coming seasons.”
Meanwhile the regions olive farmers are also suffering.
Fresh Fruit Portal report that mud up to 50cm deep dumped by the floods is hampering the chances of harvesting olives on time.
Unregulated Development Exacerbated Kashmir Floods
The Jhelum Valley received unparalleled rains during September 2014.
However, the inconvenient fact remains that the Kashmir flood disaster
was notably exacerbated by human interventions in the river basin,
reports Bharat Lal Seth for
International Rivers.
Jhelum River Basin Floods, September 2015
Last
year the Jhelum River Basin received unprecedented rainfall in the
Kashmir Valley. It was the wettest September in recorded history;
several weather stations broke their 24 and 48 hour records. The
administrators in the region were swift to call the downpour and
resulting deluge a “hydro-met tragedy”.
Hydro-met
is a contraction for the terms hydrological and meteorological, and
therefore the loss of lives, infrastructure and property in this flood
disaster was laid squarely on unpredictable precipitation patterns and a
fast changing climate. Yet, although undeniably the Jhelum Valley
received unparalleled September rains, the inconvenient fact remains
that the disaster was notably exacerbated by human interventions in the
river basin.
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The flood waters of the river Jhelum breached embankments at various points in September 2014
Photo: Bharat Lal Seth |
In
a candid concession, Javed Jafar, chief engineer of the irrigation and
flood control department, said that besides heavy rain and discharge,
the urban and rural encroachments in the river basin – including
infrastructure such as railway lines, expressway and other roads –
played a negative role in creating bottlenecks, which exacerbated the
floods to the tune of “15-20%”. What Jafar meanderingly acknowledged,
but didn’t stress, is the need for better infrastructural planning in
the floodplain instead of encroaching and building on the wetlands and
lakes that are a natural sponge for floodwaters.
“Our master
planning is skewed. Under the garb of tourism there is a cartel, which
acts against the preservation of ecosystems. We need to do away with
development without planning,” said Iftikhar A. Hakim, chief town
planner of Srinagar, the capital of Jammu and Kashmir that was badly hit
by the September floods.
“Srinagar, with a
population of 1.4 million, is not only exposed to constant danger from
floods, but is itself the cause of floods”
“Srinagar,
with a population of 1.4 million, is not only exposed to constant
danger from floods, but is itself the cause of floods” he added, saying
that unregulated urbanization worsened the impacts of the flood.
At
a media workshop held April 6-8, organized by the Centre for
Environment Education and The Third Pole, it was made clear by expert
presentations and a visit to particular river catchments that urban and
rural encroachments in the floodplain worsened the risks and impacts of
flooding in the valley. “We didn’t fail in 2014; we failed much before
it,” said Saleem Beg, a member of the National Monuments Authority.
“We’re doing away with wetlands and water bodies essential for the
health of the river system”, he said. The authority, among other things,
is responsible for considering permissions for construction in
prohibited and regulated areas.
The Jhelum, 725 kilometers in
length, has the calmest descent among the Himalayan rivers in the Indus
River Basin. In 150 km of the upper stretch the river descends a mere
24-meters, which makes the Jhelum a relatively silent river that is
inclined to overflow its banks in the Kashmir valley. This
characteristic makes the drainage basin wetland and system of lakes
particularly vital to deal with floodwaters. Inspite of this, the spread
of
Wular Lake, one of the largest
freshwater lakes in Asia, and part of the Jhelum drainage basin, reduced
from 159 sq km in 1911 to 86 sq km in 2007. Due to such happenings the
carrying capacity of the river basin is reducing; the volume of flood
discharge in September 2014 was three times the carrying capacity of the
river.
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The spread of Wular lake, part of the Jhelum drainage basin, reduced from 159 sq km in 1911 to 86 sq km in 2007.
Photo: Bharat Lal Seth |
Weather Forecaster in Hot Seat
During
the period 1901-2013, the average September rainfall in the region has
been approximately 33 mm. Notably, six times the average was received
last year. At last week’s workshop, Sonam Lotus, scientist with the
Indian Meteorology Department, stationed in Kashmir for more than 9
years, talked us through the terrifying days of September 1 to 7. Very
high rainfall was received on the 3
rd night and 4
th morning. Sonam, in the hot seat, gave a warning to the administrators on the 3
rd
afternoon that they would have a “window period” as they were “not
expecting this much water”. Instead there was incessant downpour over
the next 48 hours and beyond, with no window period in sight. The
misinformation was labeled as “human limitation”, and Sonam claimed that
with the technology at his disposal it wasn’t possible to predict such
high “abnormal” rainfall with certainty. “Don’t wait for the disaster,
prepare now,” says Sonam now, alluding to the fact that much can be done
in terms of giving the river space as well as in disaster preparedness.
He spoke of a conversation in May last year that he had with a water
resources engineer who had a premonition that “the big flood was
coming”.
“How good are we at spotting trends? The media is there
when it happens, but what happens before?” questioned Joydeep Gupta of
The Third Pole, co-organizer of the workshop, stressing the need for
pre-disaster awareness and reporting.
Natural calamities are only
further heightened when short-term real estate interests eschew the
functions of a floodplain. The same was the case in
Uttarakhand in 2013, when hydropower projects, rampant muck dumping and river bank encroachments worsened the impact of the raging flood waters.
Given
the increasing occurrence of such intense and incessant week-long
rainfall events, it is essential to put in place preventive measures
that assist in delaying water flow in the catchment – not only to the
main stem, but also the streams and tributaries, water bodies and lakes,
which together increase the carrying capacity in the river basin. Our
interventions on and around rivers need to be scrutinized not just in
the postmortem of such tragedies, but re-engineered in to our
nonexistent River Basin planning.
Kazakhstan – 15,000 Evacuated as Melting Snow Causes Floods in 4 Regions
Higher temperatures during the last fews days of March, and then
again from 06 April, have increased the melting of snow and caused
widespread flooding in central and eastern
Kazakhstan since 12 April 2015.
Local
media say temperatures rose to around 20 degrees Centigrade. The rise
in temperatures was accompanied by rainfall in some areas, increasing
snowmelt further, and resulting in flooding in at least 4 regions.
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| Snowmelt floods in Kazakhstan, April 2015. Photo: Emergency Committee of the Ministry of Internal Affairs in Kazakhstan |
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| Snowmelt floods in Kazakhstan, April 2015. Photo: Emergency Committee of the Ministry of Internal Affairs in Kazakhstan |
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| Snowmelt floods in Kazakhstan, April 2015. Photo: Emergency Committee of the Ministry of Internal Affairs in Kazakhstan |
The regions of Akmola, Karagandy, Pavlodar and East Kazakhstan have since declared a state of emergency.
The
Emergency Committee of the Ministry of Internal Affairs in Kazakhstan
report that 35 people had to be rescued and 14,790 people have been
evacuated in total. Around 2,000 of the evacuees were soon able to
return to their homes.
Karagandy region is thought to be the worst
affected area after local rivers, including the River Nura overflowed.
Floods across Karagandy have forced around 6,500 people from their
homes. The Emergency Committee say that over 1,700 homes have been
flooded in as many as 35 separate villages in the region.
Parts of Kyzylorda Oblast region in
southern Kazakhstan suffered similar flooding in March 2014.
-
Daily Nation |
Floodlist.
