Friday, September 5, 2008

YEAR OF THE SAVAGE MOONSOON

GREATER ASIA HIT BY WORST FLOODS IN LIVING MEMORY

Extreme floods and typhoons across greater Asia over the last three
months have severely affected tens of millions of people from the
Indian subcontinent, Southeast Asia and Far East China, Korea and Japan.

Since June the Asian southwest monsoon has claimed 1,500 lives and
caused damage worth many billions of dollars.

Much of Asia's poor are still living in low-lying areas prone to
flooding and in houses incapable of withstanding strong winds.

August has been a horror month for savage weather and natural
disasters, according reports sent to Daily Planet Media.

The following is a summary of what happened:

* Typhoon Olga flooded much of Southeast Asia before striking the
Korean peninsula.
* Manila, the capital of the Philippines, and three surrounding
provinces were declared "a state of calamity" on August 2 after 300
millimeters of rain fell in two days. The death toll across the
Philippines is estimated at more than 90.
* In Vietnam the heaviest rainfalls in 20 years resulting in severe
flooding to the southern central provinces of Binh Thuan, Lam Dong and
Dac Lac.
* The major arterial highway that links Hanoi to Ho Chi Minh City was
cut for three days.
* Floods in southern Cambodia cut off the main port town of
Sihanoukville from the capital Phnom Penh and the main highway was two
meters under water for several days.
* Severe flooding inundated much of Thailand's Chantaburi province
east of Bangkok leaving 90,000 homeless.
* Typhoon Olga brought savage storms to Korea and heavy floodings to
southern Japan.
* North Korea that is the grips of a four-year famine lost 40,000
hectares of farming land from Olga's storms.

The month's most severe flooding, described as the "worst in living
memory", ruined much of the Indian subcontinent as well as valuable
Chinese rice lands.

Hit hard was China's Yangtze River system, which is home to 400
million people. The floods have directly affected over 66 million people.

The Yellow River districts have been issued with warnings that much
higher than average rainfalls are likely to cause more flooding and
overwhelm the inadequate flood protection along the river.

Torrential rains since late June caused major flooding along the
tributaries of the Ganges River, and swathes of the Bihar state were
devastated when more than 400,000 hectares of land submerged and 7,000
homes destroyed.

The Bangladesh Department of Environment estimates two million people
in the capital city of Dhaka have this year lived in flooded
conditions for up to 65 days. Health officials estimate that the
fouling of the city's water by sewerage created conditions caused over
115,000 people to contract severe diarrhea and caused the death of 178
people.


Digg Technorati del.icio.us Stumbleupon Reddit Blinklist Furl Spurl Yahoo Simpy

No comments: