Floods
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Better Earth

US: Race to raise town's flood wall after levee breaches


MSNBC
Tue, 14 Jun 2011 09:30 UTC
Secondary levee is being raised by 3 feet as Missouri River waters approach
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© Nati Harnik/APThe breached Missouri River levee near Hamburg, Iowa, is seen at bottom letting water into farmland on Monday.
Hamburg, Iowa - Crews are trying to beat floodwaters expected to arrive in this Missouri River town on Tuesday by building up a secondary barrier to protect it from a massive hole in the main levee.

The river ruptured two levees in northwest Missouri on Monday, sending torrents of water over rural farmland toward Hamburg in southwest Iowa and a Missouri resort community downriver.

By Wednesday, water spilling through a nearly 300-foot hole in the levee near Hamburg, population 1,100, was expected to top a secondary levee started last week to protect the town.

The Army Corps of Engineers said crews are working to increase that wall's height by 3 feet. If it breaks, parts of Hamburg could be under as much as 10 feet of standing water, officials said.

"For right now, we believe we'll be able to get that elevation raised in the time available as that water flows across in the next 48 hours," Col. Bob Ruch, the corps' Omaha District commander, said Monday evening. "We've had excellent working conditions."
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Bizarro Earth

Heavy rains and floods kill 100 people in China

Clifford Coonan
Irish Times
Mon, 13 Jun 2011 22:34 UTC
china flood
© ReutersRescue workers move people to a safe area in Xiushui county, Jiangxi province, China. Areas which were recently drought-stricken were transformed into flood zones by heavy rains.Rescue workers move people to a safe area in Xiushui county, Jiangxi province, China. Areas which were recently drought-stricken were transformed into flood zones by heavy rains
China continued to deal with extremes of weather at the weekend as the central and southern regions, which were drought-stricken just days ago, were transformed into flood zones by pounding rains, killing more than 100 people.

Fearful of an even greater catastrophe, the China Meteorological Administration yesterday issued a level-three emergency alert in response to strong rainstorms that were expected to hit the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze river.

A provincial government adviser told the Xinhua news agency how drought had increased the risk of disaster, as the soil had become dried out, prompting more landslide risk.
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Alarm Clock

Warning: extreme weather ahead

John Vidal
The Guardian
Mon, 13 Jun 2011 15:47 UTC
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© Willoughby Owen/Getty Images/FlickrA tornado makes its way across Baca county, Colorado, in May 2010.
Tornados, wildfires, droughts and floods were once seen as freak conditions. But the environmental disasters now striking the world are shocking signs of 'global weirding'

Drought zones have been declared across much of England and Wales, yet Scotland has just registered its wettest-ever May. The warmest British spring in 100 years followed one of the coldest UK winters in 300 years. June in London has been colder than March. February was warm enough to strip on Snowdon, but last Saturday it snowed there.

Welcome to the climate rollercoaster, or what is being coined the "new normal" of weather. What was, until quite recently, predictable, temperate, mild and equable British weather, guaranteed to be warmish and wettish, ensuring green lawns in August, now sees the seasons reversed and temperature and rainfall records broken almost every year. When Kent receives as much rain (4mm) in May as Timbuktu, Manchester has more sunshine than Marbella, and soils in southern England are drier than those in Egypt, something is happening.

Comment: Yes, the climate is changing. No, it's not caused by man-made forces. For the real scoop on 'climate change', try these:

Planet-X, Comets and Earth Changes by J.M. McCanney

Planetary Alignments and the Solar Capacitor - Things are heatin' up!

Cyclones, Earthquakes, Volcanoes And Other Electrical Phenomena

Pole Shift? Look to the Skies!

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Cloud Lightning

Heavy rain, melting snow cause devastating floods across Norway, washing away houses, roads


The Associated Press
Sat, 11 Jun 2011 07:37 UTC
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© EPADevastating flooding has hit Norway.
Torrential rains combined with melting snow have caused devastating floods across central Norway, washing away several houses and roads and causing landslides.

One person has been injured in the floods, but it was unclear Saturday whether their condition was serious.

Spokesman Morten Harangen at the Directorate for Civil Protection and Emergency Planning says the northern part of the country has also been affected, but is more due to high temperatures that have sped up the snow-melting in the mountains.

Harangen says between 100-200 people have been evacuated so far.

Late Friday, Norway's Justice and Transport Minister Knut Storberget met with rescue work representatives to discuss the flood situation.
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Cloud Lightning

China: Guizhou hit by sudden heavy rain, 21 dead, 31 missing


English.xinhuanet.com
Mon, 06 Jun 2011 10:33 UTC
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© XinhuaFloodwater rushes through Wangmo county, Southwest China's Guizhou province, June 6, 2011.
After months without rain, many parts in southern China are now experiencing flooding. One week ago, provinces of Guizhou, Jiangxi, Hunan,Hubei, Jiangsu and Anhui were suffering severe drought.

But the situation took a sudden turn over the weekend, as several provinces including Guizhou, Hunan, Jiangxi and Zhejiang were hit by heavy rains over the weekend. The once-parched land is now virtually underwater.
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Cloud Lightning

China Floods Kill 52 People, More Rain Forecast in South


Xinhuanet
Wed, 08 Jun 2011 11:23 UTC
China flood
© n/a
Floods have killed 52 people and left 32 missing in China since the flood season started in June, a senior official said Wednesday, warning of more heavy rains.

Heavy rains have inundated parts of 12 provinces in central and southern China and affected 4.81 million people so far since the flood season arrived, Shu Qingpeng, deputy head of the Office of State Flood Control and Drought Relief Headquarters, told a Wednesday press conference.

In the worst-hit southwestern province of Guizhou, floods have killed 21 people and left 32 missing in the past few days, forcing nearly 100,000 people to evacuate.

More than 3,000 rescuers are working to locate the missing and fight the floods in the province's Wangmo County, where all the deaths and most of the missing were reported after downpours lashed the county Monday morning.
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Bizarro Earth

US: 'Wild and Weird' Weather Leaves its Mark

Doyle Rice and William M. Welch
USA Today
Wed, 08 Jun 2011 01:08 UTC
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© Joe Gamm, The Amarillo Globe News, via APJames Dickinson, left, and Alton Pickup of the United States Forest Service Task Force attempt to slow the spread of a wildfire in Randall County, Texas, on May 25.
Monster tornadoes, historic floods, massive wildfires and widespread drought: Springtime has delivered a wallop of weather-related destruction and misery across much of the nation this year. And it may all be related.

Never mind the debate over global warming, its possible causes and effects. We've got "global weirding."

That's how climatologist Bill Patzert describes the wide range of deadly weather effects that have whipped the nation this year, killing hundreds of people and doing billions of dollars in damage to homes, businesses, schools and churches.

"Sometimes it gets wild and weird," says Patzert, a research scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.
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Cloud Lightning

Floods Swamp Earthquake-Ravaged Haiti, Killing 23

Clarens Renois
Agence France-Presse
Tue, 07 Jun 2011 12:02 UTC
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© Agence France-Presse / Thony BelizaireChildren make their way to school through a flooded area in Port-au-Prince
Torrential rains lashed Haiti on Tuesday, flooding shanty towns, swamping the squalid camps erected after a 2010 earthquake and killing at least 23 people, officials said.

The worst rains to hit the impoverished country this year -- at the start of the hurricane season -- paralyzed the capital, where most of the deaths took place, according to officials at Haiti's civil protection agency.

Thunderstorms were pounding several north Caribbean islands early Tuesday, but there was little chance of the large low pressure area developing into a hurricane, according to the US-based National Hurricane Center (NHC).

Several days of rain had already swelled rivers, however, and the NHC warned of "flash floods and mudslides over portions of Haiti, the Dominican Republic, Jamaica and Cuba."

Haiti was most at risk of devastation from the wet weather, due to its crumbling infrastructure and ramshackle shelters for tens of thousands left homeless after the catastrophic 7.0 magnitude earthquake in January 2010.

Health officials here also fear an uptick in fatalities from a cholera outbreak that erupted last October. The diarrheal illness thrives in crowded areas where people rely on contaminated water.
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Cloud Lightning

Floods Kill 14 In Drought-Stricken China


Sky News
Tue, 07 Jun 2011 16:46 UTC
China flood
Vehicles battled the flood waters as streets were turned into rivers
Floodwaters have killed 14 people and left scores missing in China's southwest as other parts of the country suffer their worst drought in 50 years.

The provincial civil affairs bureau said the rain-triggered floods had hit 11 cities and counties in the Guizhou province since Friday, affecting at least 270,000 people.

At least 35 people are missing in the floods, which have toppled thousands of homes, washed away hundreds of cars and destroyed roads and bridges.
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House

Canada: Lake Manitoba swallowed homes - residents


CBC News
Thu, 02 Jun 2011 12:06 UTC
manitoba storm damage
© CBCMany homes and cottages along the south shore of Lake Manitoba have been severely damaged by Tuesday's violent storm
Residents along Twin Beach Road worked hard to protect their properties from flooding, but their efforts proved no match for a storm packing 90 km/h winds on rain-swollen Lake Manitoba.

The storm hit on Tuesday, damaging numerous properties in the Rural Municipality of St. Laurent - Twin Lakes Beach, Laurentian Beach, Delta Beach, and Sandpiper Beach.

David Sawicky said Wednesday he had to wade into rising floodwaters at his home to rescue his father and his dog.

Still, Sawicky said, he didn't expect the damage to his property to be that bad.
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