7 ms·
Satellites Reveal Cause of Uttarakhand Flood That Devastated Hydroelectric Dams
- sradman 6y agoThe Feb 07 flood in India [1] was first thought to be a burst glacial lake but: > Other reports have suggested that satellite images imply that a landslide may have triggered the events... In satellite images, a 0.5 mi (0.80 km) scar is visible on the slopes of the Nanda Ghunti, a peak on the southwestern rim of the Nanda Devi sanctuary, a wall of mountains surrounding the Nanda Devi massif. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2021_Uttarakhand_flood#Cause https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2021_Uttarakhand_flood#Cause
- londons_explore 6y agoI was under the impression that while the exact time of a landslide is hard to predict, it is relatively easy to predict that an area of land might suffer landslides. (ie. by looking at the angle of every layer of rock and looking for any that are near their critical slippage angle) Surely that is checked for all land surrounding any hydro project, and the land stabilized with piles or grout before the hydro project starts?
- danans 6y agoIt appears that the side of a 6000m (20000 ft) mountain collapsed. Clearly this has happened many times through the geological history of the Himalaya - which is arguably the most extreme and dynamic mountain range on the planet - but on human timescales this is an extreme outlier event, so very hard to plan for.
- rriepe 6y agoThe buried lede: A landslide blocked a river and water backed up.
- koheripbal 6y agoIt's a generally poorly written article, with a lot of speculation and short on facts. I particularly dislike the way it starts "Sunday, an flood..." Which Sunday? What date?
- yostrovs 6y agoScientific American went straight downhill in the last few years, particularly devoting itself a great deal to social issues that have nothing to do with it.
- deadalus 6y agoScientific American has had problem with women before. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_American#Controversy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_American#Controvers...
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- newyorker2 6y agoThe moment I observe an article overzealously relying on direct quotes and anecdotes of everyone the 'reporter' was able to get their hands on, it's tab close time.
- dylan604 6y agoLike the news articles that have done nothing but gather random tweets from people? Journalism has become a joke of itself
- maxerickson 6y agoIf you are going to use quotation marks, it should be a direct quotation, not an ungrammatical paraphrase. It's also talking about the most recent Sunday, so perfectly sensible, though I agree it is not the best form for the statement.
- latchkey 6y agoI spent 2 years on a motorbike all over Northern Vietnam / Cambodia / Laos. The number of hydro dams being built by these countries (and China) in the region along the Mekong is insane. They already feel the effects from this... in the summer the rivers dry up to the point that you're driving a motorbike across dry lake beds and in the winter (aka: rainy season) there is massive landslides and the dams break and wash away villages. From what I can tell, it is less about blaming the dam and more about the thirst for power and complete disregard for how we go about getting it. It is a complete eco disaster.
- blacklion 6y agoI've spent 12 months of last 10 years (~1 month/year) at same region, on motorbike, too. I could confirm your observations. BTW, 95% of these dams are Chinese one and exports electricity to China, not to be used by locals. China build hospitals and some roads for this, which is good, but all these projects doesn't have any ecological expertise in it. And China DOESN'T CARE of course. It is new colonialism, really.
- vagrantJin 6y ago> China build hospitals and some roads for this, which is good, but all these projects doesn't have any ecological expertise in it. And China DOESN'T CARE of course. But isn't the honesty refreshing? They don't come with guns or bibles or any notion of superiority. Just preying on the weak willed. I call that good business.
- latchkey 6y agoYou're getting downvoted, for good reason. You're wrong on at least one point. "Any notion of superiority". One thing I witnessed first hand in Laos is that China is building a very long road south. As they come in and build dams and the roads, the construction workers also move their families into the region. They buy up land from locals and then they bring a whole new set of expectations, including driving prices up. The notion of superiority is what is driving all of this. "We are better than you, we will build you a dam, buy up all your land, give you some of the electricity and take the rest for ourselves."
- Pfhreak 6y agoDoes anyone else find it strange that the headline focuses entirely on the damage to dams and not, say, the people or homes or communities destroyed?
- actuator 6y ago> The disaster draws attention to the controversial hydropower projects Why is this the subheading of the article? All the speculation regarding the actual flood is a glacier breaking away and falling 2km on valley floor triggering landslides and sudden water release. So, why choose to focus on something which many initially incorrectly identified as the reason for destruction. I am not saying we should not focus on this and the highway construction happening there, as there actually are some valid concerns about them; but seems like a poor thing conflating these two. Also, most of these new dams in the upper reaches are not the massive water holding barrages that cause ecological destruction. Most of them hold little or no water. They are constructed on the route of a river to funnel water through a tunnel to the turbines that is used to generate power.
- idlewords 6y agoFurther in the article it explains that communities often form around the remote dams, bringing people closer to the rivers, and increasing the body count when something like this happens.
- actuator 6y agoBut that has nothing to do with the dam itself. That should be regulated by the state authorities. Living close to rivers in such fragile places is not a good idea. Back in 2013, roughly the same place witnessed ~6000 deaths in floods. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013_North_India_floods https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013_North_India_floods
- danans 6y agoBased solely on my observations traveling in the area, the topography is so extreme (very steep cliffs not far from the river banks) that there is little option but to live near the river. I'm sure there are more and less safe places on the river bank, but there aren't many places a safe distance from the river that aren't also thousands of feet up in elevation.
- pashsdk27 6y ago
- temp-dude-87844 6y agoThis is hardly above the nebulous drivel of the articles that popped up during the week of the flood, just dressed up with a professional veneer. It manages to sneak in a clickbait headline, and despite the promise, you don't get to find out the cause, just three contributing theories. Also, did you know dams are bad? The terrain in these Himalayan states is rough. Steep river valleys, no flat land, and towns clinging to cliffsides. They're vulnerable to floods every day. If anything, dams alter the risk profile dramatically, increasing the impact of the rarest of floods but greatly reducing their frequency. And, they generate soot-free, low-carbon electricity from these rivers that are hardly ecological havens: they're the upper tributaries of some of the most polluted rivers on the planet. Altering the natural environment is always a trade-off we should examine and justify. But in this instance, they add up. Without the dams, an identical flood would've resulted in at least as many casualties, and that will continue to be the case until you build even bigger dams whose reservoirs provide more cushion against freak floods, melt, and landslides, and/or until you banish people from their homes in towns that dot these deep gorges at a great socioeconomic cost. The environmental risks are an inseparable part of the region. You can't wish the possibility of all landslides away, the glaciers can misbehave as long as they exist (and we want them to exist), and the topography and the settlement patterns will remain vulnerable to floods. Only abandonment, damming, or relocating the towns to flattened ridgelines stand a chance to improve outcomes for its people, and all of these come at high cost and involve major trade-offs.
- robocat 6y ago> hardly ecological havens Ecologically the harshest environments are also the most vulnerable to small changes. Plants and insects at the edges of survivability only need what we might consider a minor change to push them to extinction. Slow, low, small growth is often boring and ignored by us. Individual mountains often have unique ecologies and species because they are “islands”. And sometimes the harshest environments are the most biologically pristine because there are not many humans around (farming is probably our most ecologically destructive activity). I don’t know anything particular about the Himalayas, but I am just asking you take care before jumping to conclusions.
- haltingproblem 6y agoI used to like reading newspapers from across the spectrum. They had information and facts leavened with reasoned opinions, balanced perspectives. Reading the news media these days is no different than reading some rando on Twitter. Tragic it has come to do this. The NY Times had a truly abominable series of articles on these all focusing on the "negligence" of the current government on building dams. Take this one for dated 2/8: "Before Himalayan Flood, India Ignored Warnings of Development Risks" [1] Somewhere at the end: "Exactly what caused the latest flooding was not clear as of Monday night, with the Indian government saying a team of experts would visit the site to investigate. Ranjeet Rath, the head of India’s geological survey, said initial information suggested a “glacial calving at highest altitude.” Calving is the breaking of ice chunks from a glacier’s edge." Dams had absolutely nothing to do with this tragedy. Some folks on Twitter are claiming that Dams might have reduced casualties downstream by modulating the flow but every single article seems to have an anti-dam agenda. I too hate the aesthetic of dams because they are monolithic and massive and alter the landscape. There is something primal within us which clamors for unaltered nature. I also don't like the eyesore of the gas-fired power plant a two miles away from where I live. But I don't try to warp every tragedy and lay it at the feet of the power plant to further my aesthetic biases. [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/08/world/asia/india-flood-ignored-warnings.html https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/08/world/asia/india-flood-ig...
- actuator 6y agoNYT might be a paragon of journalism for American issues but it is hardly a good source for news about countries like China or India. I have been following their international coverage for some time and what they have mastered is the art of misleading through omission. Whether that is intended or just by virtue of hiring journalists and op-ed writers from the same echo chamber, that I don't know. It is smart in a way actually, as they rarely write outright lies. What they will do instead is just cover the points of one side, keep doing it through several articles and someone following NYT will have a very different idea of an event. I am not sure how NYT is gauged inside China as I can't read their social media but I am surprised NYT is treated like sacrosanct by Indians with their critical articles of the establishment being widely shared there. Just look at the coverage of the farmer protests in NYT, Guardian etc. So when these same platforms complain about Facebook eating their lunch and allowing fake news, I have no sympathy for them as their holier than thou attitude for their own content is just off putting.
- wolfretcrap 6y agoI live 50km away from this place. And people live near river because it's easier to take water from the river. Rivers are violent during the summer and monsoon season, other times they are furious but not that violent and you can easily throw a bucket and get the water you need. Slowly borewell came and people started using that while still occasionally going to river when there's too much rush at borewell. Government didn't help to dig multiple ones but these days almost no one goes to river anymore - we get the water from a creek which is supplied to our home using pipelines and now electricity, cable TV, and internet is available even in the remotest village in Himalayas except a few ofc. Why people are stuck living at such places? Mostly due to sense of community. My own grandparents got rich through trade in commodities which these land produced and were given opportunity to move elsewhere but the reason they didn't move is because they did not want to lose their village community. These days it also has changed, now people don't really care about each other even in villages and most teenegers leave the village for studies and most of them never come back. Since e-commerce websites and internet came to these villages, people have become more individualistic. Earlier you could have easily asked for monetary help from any member of village and they'd have given it to you easily but not now it seems everyone the community is lost even tho the standards of living are far better with supplied water, toilets in every home, government offering essentials to poor people in village. Most people even stopped agriculture in Himalayas because labor is hard to find now. Most labor will go to plains where large continuous tracts of land provide better output and more wages/quality of life and mobility. As a result my grandparents 50 acres of land is now a waste. We grow nothing on them. Given it a few generations and these villages will no longer exist.
- kludgeon 6y agothis article is trash and does not reveal anything. it's as if two different people wrote the article and the headline.
- Animats 6y agoBut he also explains that the friction of an avalanche creates a lot of heat, which could have melted much of the ice tumbling down the mountainside. Hm. It takes 334,000 J to melt a kilogram of ice. At least; that's just the energy to go from solid to water. It takes a vertical drop of about 35Km to get that much energy. Check me on this, please.
- mkl 6y agoThat's for ice at 0°C too. I make it a 34km drop for 1kg of ice to gain that much energy. Are we missing something?
- Animats 6y agoI wonder if that author was misquoted. He has a PhD in glacier hydrology.[1] He has to know there just isn't enough potential energy in falling ice to melt it rapidly. [1] https://udayton.edu/directory/artssciences/geology/haritashya_umesh.php https://udayton.edu/directory/artssciences/geology/haritashy...
- mkl 6y agoCould well be. Maybe it's about it falling to lower altitudes with higher temperatures, and the friction of the avalanche warms it a bit and breaks it up so it can melt quickly in the warmer air.
- _nalply 6y agoAt the Bondo landslide in Switzerland 2017 (https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-41036851 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-41036851), a lot of water came from glacier ice melted from tumbling down.
- Animats 6y agoNot seeing that in the article. That looks like a combined avalanche and mudslide. It's normal for sliding ice to melt under pressure at the surface, lubricating movement. That's how ice skating works.
- irockzz 6y agoI never forget 16 June 2013.
- irockzz 6y agohttps://www.downtoearth.org.in/coverage/natural-disasters/heavens-rage-41497 https://www.downtoearth.org.in/coverage/natural-disasters/he...