Millions flee 'worst ever' floods

[eppur_se_muova]

Source: CNN

NEW DELHI, India (CNN) -- Monsoon rains in South Asia have driven millions from their homes and caused what the United Nations says is the worst flooding in living memory.

More than 1,000 people have been killed or injured by rising waters, but aid agencies say the figure is expected to rise sharply.

U.N. children's body UNICEF said it had lost track of how many people had been affected by the floods across India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Nepal.

So far about 20 million people are known to have fled their homes or trapped in villages at risk from landslides, snakebites and disease.

Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/asiapcf/08/03/soasia.floods/index.html

[NMDemDist2]

1. Holy Chit!!

:cry:

[varun]

2. Melting glaciers

contribute to this flooding. Global warming will disproportionately affect people in south Asia.

[Bigmack]

3. Hey... WTF... they're only....

brown people!

When property along the Florida coast is under water, and some rich white people are treading water, then this will be news.

[bikebloke]

4. Bangladesh

Back in the mid-80's I flew into Dhaka, Bangladesh. Most of the country was underwater then with post-monsoon flooding. I was planning to travel overland up into Nepal. No way. I had to buy an air ticket and fly up.

In Dhaka, I was told that 200 - 300 infants a day die when they have flooding.

[UKProPeace]

5. This extreme weather is a much bigger threat than terrorism

Look at all the millions affected by extreme weather over the past few years alone all around the world. Unfortunately, extreme weather like this seems like it will continue. Leaders need to seriously be doing something about ways of protecting their populations.

[eppur_se_muova]

6. GW in general is certainly a far bigger threat than terra. Welcome to DU!

:hi:

(Be sure to use the abbreviation 'GW' for global warming, it casts a sidewise snark at Bu**sh**.)

[UKProPeace]

7. Hi eppur, and thanks.

Even the British chief Scientific adviser has said this is the case - For those who haven't seen this report:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/3381425.stm

[rodeodance]

8. Monsoon floods displace 19 million

Source: cnn




Monsoon floods displace 19 million

* Story Highlights
* 19 million driven from their homes by floods in South Asia, officials say
* Estimates of total deaths vary from a few hundred to well over 1,000
* India, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Nepal all hit by rising waters
* Rhinos forced from their habitat have killed at least one person


LUCKNOW, India (AP) -- Havoc from monsoon rains killed another 12 people in India, including two children swept away by floods and a man attacked by a rhinoceros forced out of its inundated habitat, officials said Saturday.


Helicopters dropped food to hundreds of thousands of frightened villagers perched on rooftops.

Vital to farmers, the annual rains are a blessing and a curse for the subcontinent. At least 198 people have been killed in India and neighboring Bangladesh and 19 million driven from their homes in recent days, according to government figures.

The South Asian monsoon season runs from June to September as the rains work their way across the subcontinent. It's always dangerous -- last year more than 1,000 people died, most from drowning, landslides or house collapses.



Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/asiapcf/08/04/asia.floods.ap/index.html

[aquart]

9. 19 MILLION?????

Is this normal?

[La Lioness Priyanka]

10. no, its much higher than normal.

[aquart]

11. Last paragraph, they admit that this is ABNORMAL.

An extremely misleading story. The last two years have seen deadly ABNORMAL monsoons. But the lead paragraph tries to make it seem that this is just what happens annually. NO, it's not. Not when cropland is being destroyed.

[Xithras]

17. Cropland being destroyed is pretty normal.

The problem with that particular region is a combination of runaway overpopulation, flat terrain with millions of people living only a few feet above the rivers normal high water mark, millions more living in the ANNUAL flood zone, and no levees to protect any of them. For a combination of economic, religious, and political reasons, there are no dams on the river to keep its waters in check. That combination means years that are even slightly above average (and, on average, monsoons will be above average about half of the time) will lead to floods that end up displacing huge numbers of people.

There is an environmental component to this, but it isn't global warming. A bigger contributor to the Brahmaputra flooding like this is far more mundane...deforestation. Much of the rivers basin has been clearcut over the past few decades to make room for the increasing population. The forests used to hold much of the monsoonal rain and moderate the flooding it caused downstream. Without the forests, monsoonal rains simply run off all at once now, and flash down the river in massive floods. The easy solution would be to replant the forests, but then what do you do with the millions of people that would displace?

[ananda]

12. That's the whole state of Texas and more!

It's three or four Houston areas alone.

I can't even imagine it.

Global warming.. quite a curse.

[Ian David]

13. I can't even begin to imagine the scale of something like that. But we'll all understand...

when it starts happening HERE.

And someday, Sally(click) Struther(click)onkwo will be all over African television infomercials, begging people to send money to the poor, starving children in North America, displaced by rising sea levels and starved by drought.

[cliss]

14. It's because of the cloud layers.

the clouds are pulling away from the Equator. They are moving north & south. that's why we're having flooding in England & Sweden (north), and flooding in India (south). And that's why you have heat waves in Bulgaria and forest fires on the Canary Islands and drought conditions in other countries close to the equator.

It seems that is just the beginning, unfortunately.

[defendandprotect]

15. Global Warming's effects could be seen prior to 1980 --

and anyone who understood or bothered to look at overpopulation and the utter and total pollution of our planet would understand that all of this will compound --

As the Pentagon pointed out to Bush a few years back, Global Warming is a bigger threat to our nation than terrorism --

And, of course it is -- !!!

Just as the Republicans are a bigger threat to our nation and international peace and security than the "terrorists" are --

as we entere their "Third World America" of falling bridges and failing infrastructure --

As we watch the STILL lack of response to KATRINA victims we may ponder that we may all soon be KATRINA victims ourselves.

[cliss]

16. Here's a photo ~

from Dagens Nyheter, Swedish online newspaper.

<a href="http://photobucket.com" target="_blank"><img src="" border="0" alt="Photo Sharing and Video Hosting at Photobucket"></a>

[AngryAmish]

18. I think Noah would disagree with this headline