KSTan

Asia Pacific experienced  massive earthquakes, tsunamis and typhoons over the past two weeks.  The volcanic eruptions are spread over an area of almost 10,000 kilometers from Samoa Islands to Indonesia and back to Vanuatu.  Earthquakes occurring within hours of each other are not common, though in 1917 and 1920 there were eruptions at Samoa and Vanuatu quite close to the epicenter of the recent quakes.

In 2004 a 9.3 magnitude earthquake caused a super tsunami killing 300,000 people  over Indonesia, Thailand, India and Sri Lanka. The epicenter is almost at the same point as the Padang earthquake.

Are all these eruptions random and coincidental or are they part of a chain of eruptions mother nature is about to unleash on planet earth ?

At about the same period of the eruptions, typhoons were lashing out at Asian countries, especially those in the typhoon belt namely Taiwan, Hong Kong, Japan, Southern China, Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos.

This year’s typhoon season seem to be lasting longer and is more violent than previous years causing massive misery, loss of lives and property and displacement of people.

Watch some slides (pics mostly from Time.com, AP and AFP) of the human miseries brought on by the typhoons.

Watch the havoc created by the Padang 7.6 magnitude Volcanic Eruption

While humans  cannot be held responsible for mother nature’s wrath especially earthquakes and typhoons, we definitely are responsible in many ways for the floods and the human tragedy that follows.

Through our bad and irresponsible management of natural resources, deforestation, excessive carbon emission and over development coupled with administrative inefficiencies, ineffective bureaucracy and corruption amongst the government and civil service, humans have aggravated and accelerated the calamities.  Governments often lack the will to prepare for such emergencies resulting in food, medicine and shelter not reaching those in need and often when it reaches the victims, it is too late.

In Aug 2008, the Kosi River which is a tributary of the mighty Ganges in India, bursted its bank  causing massive flood in the Bihar region.  Of course the Government blamed the heavy rains. More than 3 million people were displaced. It is the worst flood experienced by India in over a century. At this point in time, (Oct 2009)  millions in India again face food shortages due to flood destroying farm lands used to grow rice.

In 2007, the Inter-Government Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) had predicted intense weather conditions coming in successions and in the same area. These predictions are beginning to show in the recent quakes, typhoons and floods in Asia Pacific regions.

Temperatures are rising,  glaciers and the polar caps are melting and the sea level is rising.  Hurricanes and typhoons pick up massive evaporation from the sea and dump them which over land increasing the severity of floods and landslides.

In the case of India, the state of Bihar is almost synonymous with misery and corruption.   Parliament put the blame solely on the local government.  However, the Central government were  aware of this flood potential years earlier through satellite pictures and have failed to reinforce embankments in the upper reaches of the river nearer to Tibet.  Money had been allocated, it probably never reach where it was needed.

As aid was slow or not forthcoming, most of the victims made an exodus to relief centres and higher grounds.  Clearly this is a manmade disaster.

Watch the exodus in these slides here.

There is more bad news for Planet Earth.

Watch how Greenland’s ice is melting faster than expected.

This entry was posted on Thursday, October 15th, 2009 at 2:41 am and is filed under Conservation, Corruption, Global Warming. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.