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Tidal Flooding
Southeast Asia is being pummelled by unusually severe floods this year, as late-arriving storms and relentless rains wreak havoc that has caught many places off guard. Deaths have topped 1,200 across Indonesia, Sri Lanka, and Thailand, with more than 800 still missing in floods and landslides. In Indonesia, entire villages remain cut off after bridges and roads were swept away. Thousands in Sri Lanka lack clean water, while Thailand's prime minister acknowledged shortcomings in his government's response. Malaysia is still reeling from one its worst floods, which killed three and displaced thousands. Meanwhile, Vietnam and the Philippines have faced a year of punishing storms and floods that have left hundreds dead. What feels unprecedented is exactly what climate scientists expect: A new normal of punishing storms, floods and devastation. Southeast Asia should brace for a likely continuation and potential worsening of extreme weather in 2026 and for many years immediately following
Recovery and aid efforts are underway in parts of Southeast Asia and South Asia where the full number of dead and missing are not yet known after heavy rains and flooding left a devastating toll in the past week. The severe weather killed at least 469 people in Indonesia, 162 in Thailand and 334 in Sri Lanka, authorities said. In Thailand, Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul on Saturday outlined recovery and compensation plans for the southern part of the country, where the Department of Disaster Prevention and Mitgiation said severe flooding in 12 southern provinces affected more than 1.4 million households and 3.8 million people. Sri Lanka authorities said Monday that rescuers are still searching for 370 missing people. Nearly 148,000 people are housed in temporary shelters after being battered in the past week downpours that flooded homes, fields and roads and triggered landslides, primarily in the tea-growing central hill country. Indonesia President Prabowo Subianto on Monday .
Heavy floodwaters swept across southwestern Jamaica, winds tore roofs off buildings and boulders tumbled onto roads Tuesday as Hurricane Melissa came ashore as a catastrophic Category 5 storm, one of the strongest Atlantic hurricanes on record. Landslides, fallen trees and numerous power outages were reported as Melissa hit with 295 kph winds near New Hope, with officials cautioning that the cleanup and damage assessment could be slow. There is no infrastructure in the region that can withstand a Category 5, Prime Minister Andrew Holness said. The question now is the speed of recovery. That's the challenge. Floodwaters trapped at least three families in their homes in the community of Black River in western Jamaica, and crews were unable to help them because of dangerous conditions, said Desmond McKenzie, deputy chairman of Jamaica's Disaster Risk Management Council. Roofs were flying off, he said. We are hoping and praying that the situation will ease so that some attempt can be m
Flooding in a northwest Pakistani district has killed at least 220 people, officials said Saturday, as rescuers pulled 63 more bodies overnight from homes flattened by flash floods and landslides, with forecasts of more rain in the coming days. One eyewitness, who escaped the deluges in Buner, described seeing floodwaters carrying hundreds of boulders and tons of rocks crashing down. Hundreds of rescue workers are still searching for survivors in Buner, one of several places in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province where torrential rains and cloudbursts caused massive flooding on Friday, said Mohammad Suhail, a spokesman for the emergency services. Dozens of homes were swept away. First responders have been trying to recover bodies from the worst-hit villages of Pir Baba and Malik Pura, where most of the fatalities were, said Kashif Qayyum, a deputy commissioner in Buner. Local police officer Imtiaz Khan, who narrowly escaped the deluges, said floodwaters carrying hundreds of boulders struck
Several people, including school children, were stranded in parts of Madhya Pradesh's Shivpuri district due to a flood-like situation after heavy rains, prompting the authorities to call the Army for rescue and relief work, officials said on Wednesday. A flood-like situation has also arisen in Guna district, where a bridge on a culvert caved-in. People from several villages in Guna have been asked to move to safer places, they said. Due to heavy rains, Dindori, Vidisha, Jabalpur, Narmadapuram, Alirajpur, Rajgarh and Betul districts were also witnessing a similar situation and rapid relief and rescue operations were being carried out by the administration, as per the officials. Chief Minister Mohan Yadav took information about the current situation from officials at the Home Guard headquarters and gave necessary instructions to the collectors and other officials of the districts facing heavy rainfall. He said all possible help will be provided to the districts and no negligence will
At least 200 homes were damaged during a deadly flash flood in the mountain village of Ruidoso, and local emergency managers warned Wednesday that number could more than double as teams survey more neighborhoods. Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham was among the officials who took an aerial tour of Ruidoso and the surrounding area as they looked to bolster their case for more federal assistance for the community, which has been battered over the past year by wildfires and repeated flooding. The governor said the state has received partial approval for a federal emergency declaration, freeing up personnel to help with search and rescue efforts and incident management. She called it the first step, saying Ruidoso will need much more. "We will continue working with the federal government for every dollar and resource necessary to help this resilient community fully recover from these devastating floods, she said. An intense bout of monsoon rains set the disaster in motion Tuesday afternoon. .
More than 160 people are believed to be missing in Texas four days after flash floods killed over 100 people during the July Fourth weekend, Governor Greg Abbott said Tuesday. Many of those who are not accounted for were staying in state's Hill Country but did not register at a camp or hotel. The lowlands along the Guadalupe River in central Texas are filled with youth camps and campgrounds that are especially popular around summer holidays, which has made it more difficult to know how many people are missing. The big jump in the number of missing came after authorities set up a hotline for families to call. We will not stop until every missing person is accounted for, Abbott said during a news conference in Hunt, Texas, after taking a helicopter tour of the area. The 161 missing were believed to be in Kerr County, where most of the victims have recovered, Abbott said. The governor said President Donald Trump has pledged to provide whatever relief Texas needs to recover. He coul
Rescuers scoured flooded riverbanks littered with mangled trees Saturday and turned over rocks in the search for more than two dozen children from a girls' camp and many others missing after a wall of water blasted down a river in the Texas Hill Country. The storm killed at least 32 people, including 14 children. Some 36 hours after the floods, authorities have still not given a number of how many people in total are still missing beyond the 27 children from Camp Mystic, a Christian summer camp along the river. The destructive fast-moving waters rose 26 feet in just 45 minutes before daybreak Friday, washing away homes and vehicles. The danger was not over as torrential rains continued pounding communities outside San Antonio on Saturday and flash flood warnings and watches remained in effect. Searchers used helicopters, boats and drones to look for victims and to rescue stranded people in trees and from camps isolated by washed-out roads. We will not stop until we find everyone wh
Heavy flooding following torrential rains in eastern Congo washed away several villages along the shores of Lake Tanganyika, leaving at least 62 dead and 50 missing, authorities said Saturday. Witnesses described the floods surging at around 5 am Friday and sweeping away the village of Kasaba on the edge of the lake in the Ngandja sector. The South Kivu provincial health minister, Thophile Walulika Muzaliwa, said by phone that the rescue operation was hampered by a lack of services and a shutdown of telephone lines due to the flooding. Sector chiefs, village chiefs and locality chiefs, who are also members of the local government, are on site. The only humanitarian organisation currently present is the Red Cross. It is not possible to give an assessment as body searches are continuing, he said. Last month, flooding in the capital, Kinshasa, killed 33 people. Decades of fighting between government troops and rebels in eastern Congo escalated in February, worsening what is already o
At least two people drowned when their vehicles were caught in floodwaters in Oklahoma on Wednesday as slow-moving thunderstorms inundated roads across parts of that state and Texas, authorities said, while Pennsylvania residents picked up from a powerful storm that left three people dead. Heavy rains and severe thunderstorms will mean a heightened risk of flash flooding across the south-central US through early Thursday, the National Weather Service said. Rains drench parts of Oklahoma and Texas The storms drenched much of southern Oklahoma and northern Texas, flooding and washing out roads and causing hundreds of flights to be cancelled or delayed at major airports. One man drowned in Oklahoma after his vehicle got swept off a Pottawatomie County highway, said Sheriff Freeland Wood. My deputy went in to try and save him, and he got caught up in the same mess, Wood said. The deputy was treated at a local hospital and released, Wood said. Floodwaters closed nearly three dozen roa
Another round of torrential rain and flash flooding came Saturday for parts of the South and Midwest already heavily waterlogged by days of severe storms that also spawned deadly tornadoes. Forecasters warned that rivers in some places would continue to rise for days. Day after day of heavy rains have pounded the central US, rapidly swelling waterways and prompting a series of flash flood emergencies in from Texas to Ohio. The National Weather Service said dozens of locations in multiple states were expected to reach major flood stage, with extensive flooding of structures, roads, bridges and other critical infrastructure possible. At least 16 weather-related deaths have been reported since the start of the storms, including 10 in Tennessee. A 57-year-old man died Friday evening after getting out of a car that washed off a road in West Plains, Missouri. Flooding killed two people in Kentucky a 9-year-old boy swept away that same day on his way to school, and a 74-year-old whose bod
World Weather Attribution, an international collaboration, has underscored the urgent need for Nepal to limit development in low-lying, riverside areas of the cities and scale up early warning and prompt action to avoid repeat of flooding disasters. Climate change was responsible for the extreme three day downpours in Nepal about 10 percent more intense, concluded the organization in its recently published report. The flood and landslide triggered by heavy rain in Nepal in late September caused heavy loss to the country as it claimed at least 244 lives. The rainfall became 10 percent more intense by human-induced climate change, pointed out the report. Bursts of rainfall will become even more heavier, risking more destructive floods until the world replaces fossil fuels with renewable sources of energy, warned the organization. Reducing development in flood-prone areas of cities will help protect people in Nepal from future floods, according to the report. The explosive monsoon ...
Thirty-one people have lost their lives, 2 injured and 1 person is missing in the recent floods caused by continuous rainfall from August 19 to 23 in Tripura, the state government said on Wednesday.According to the state government, 53,356 people are still in the relief camps across the state."As of date, 369 relief camps are operational by the district administration, providing shelter to over 53,356 people in the state. The District Administration is continuing to provide necessary relief, including food, drinking water, medical help, etc., in relief camps. Over 27,000 food packets have been distributed till date," said an official release issued by the Relief, Rehabilitation & Disaster Management Department of the state government.The water level of the Gomati River at Sonamura has come down from above the critical level but is still above flood level, according to the release.3 teams of the State Disaster Response Force (TSR) and 2 teams of the National Disaster Response ...
North Korea will not seek outside help to recover from floods that devastated areas near the country's border with China, leader Kim Jong Un said as he ordered officials to bring thousands of displaced residents to the capital to provide them better care. Kim said it would take about two to three months to rebuild homes and stabilise the areas affected by floods. Until then, his government plans to accommodate some 15,400 people a group that includes mothers, children, older adults and disabled soldiers at facilities in Pyongyang, North Korea's official Korean Central News Agency said Saturday. KCNA said Kim made the comments during a two-day trip to northwestern town of Uiju through Friday to meet flood victims and discuss recovery efforts. The agency gave Kim its typical effusive praise, saying the visit showed his sacred leadership and warm love and ennobling spirit of making devoted service for the people. State media reports said heavy rains in late July left 4,100 houses, .
Six people, including three of a family, were killed and as many injured in Uttarakhand as heavy rains led to house collapses, flooding of areas and rise in water levels in many rivers of the state, officials said on Thursday. In Devchauli in Chamoli district, a woman and a child are missing since Wednesday evening after a house collapsed, they said and added that a State Disaster Response Force (SDRF) team has left for the spot. Nearly a dozen four-wheelers parked along the riverbed of the Sukhi in Haridwar's Kharkhari area were washed away following torrential rain on Wednesday evening. Teams of the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF), the SDRF and the administration have been deployed in affected areas of the state, the officials said. Disaster Secretary Vinod Kumar Suman said 200 passengers stranded on the Kedarnath route due to falling stones and the washing away of a 20-25 meter footpath near the Bhimbali Chowki have been moved to safer places. In Bharpur village in the
The MCD sealed seven more basements of coaching centres in Central Delhi's Old Rajendra Nagar and one each in North West Delhi's Rajdhani Enclave and East Delhi's Preet Vihar on Tuesday, following the death of three UPSC aspirants in the basement of Rau's IAS Study Circle. With this, the civic body has now cracked down on 29 basements of coaching institutes since Sunday for allegedly operating in violation of the MCD building by-laws. According to an official statement, the coaching centres that faced action in Rajinder Nagar on Tuesday include the IAS Gurukul Tathastu, Officers IAS Academy, Forum IAS, Psyche World IAS, Sanchetna IAS, Prisha IAS, Path Academy and Drishti IAS. In the MCD's latest sealing drive in Preet Vihar and Rajdhani Enclave, two basements of coaching centres faced action -- Sanskriti Academy and Pratham Institute, respectively, it said. The action comes in the wake of flooding in the basement of Rau's IAS Study Circle in Rajinder Nagar that led to the death of
The recent heavy rains in northwestern North Korea flooded thousands of houses and a vast extent of farmland and left many residents homeless and living in makeshift tents, North Korea's state media reported Wednesday. North Korea earlier said more than 5,000 people stranded in Sinuiju city and Uiju town were rescued by airlift and other evacuation work after Saturday's rains caused a river on the Chinese border to swell. But it hadn't mentioned any specific damage, or said if there were any casualties. North Korea is prone to flooding from heavy summer rains because of poor drainage, deforestation and dilapidated infrastructure. The official Korean Central News Agency said Wednesday that about 4,100 houses, 3,000 hectares (about 7,410 acres) of agricultural fields and numerous public buildings, roads and railways in Sinuiju and Uiju were flooded. It said about 150 people in nearby Jagang province had also been isolated due to a separate river flooding there, but they were all ...
The Municipal Corporation of Delhi has started action against illegal coaching centres and will set up a high-level committee to probe the flooding of the basement of a coaching institute which led to three civil services aspirants' deaths, an official said on Sunday. A team of the civic body reached the Old Rajinder Nagar area to seal several illegally-run basements of coaching centres, a statement by the Delhi government said. Around 13 such coaching centres were sealed during the action till late Sunday night. These included IAS Gurukul, Chahal Academy, Plutus Academy, Sai Trading, IAS Setu, Topper's Academy, Dainik Samvad, Civils Daily IAS, Career Power, 99 Notes, Vidya Guru, Guidance IAS, and Easy for IAS. "These coaching centres were found to be operating in basements in violation of rules and they were sealed on the spot and notices were pasted," the statement said. The Rau's IAS Study Circle, where the incident took place on Saturday, has been sealed by the police. The MC