Clipmarks | invictus's Disasters collection

Thousands dead in Chinese quake

Mon, 12 May 2008 14:40:27 GMT

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Between 3,000 and 5,000 people may have been killed by an earthquake measuring 7.8 in just one county of south-western China's Sichuan province, reports say.

Some 10,000 people are also feared to have been injured in Beichuan county.

Desperate efforts are under way to find survivors. One school that collapsed has buried an estimated 900 students.

President Hu Jintao has urged "all-out" efforts to rescue victims of the quake, which hit 92km (57 miles) from Chengdu, Sichuan's provincial capital.

The quake was felt as far away as Beijing, he says, meaning millions of people will feel connected to the disaster and will be watching TV screens closely to see how the government responds.

Tags: earthquake, china

'Doomsday' vault opens its doors

Tue, 26 Feb 2008 21:22:02 GMT

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Clip Source: news.bbc.co.uk

The opening of the "fail-safe" vault attracted a number of dignitaries

Leading dignitaries have attended the official opening of a 'doomsday' seed vault built 130m (426ft) inside a mountain on a remote Arctic island.

Norwegian Prime Minister Jen Stoltenberg and Nobel Prize winner Wangari Maathai placed the first seeds in the depository during the ceremony.

The vault, designed to withstand all natural and human disaster, will house samples of all known food crops.

The Svalbard Global Seed Vault took 12 months and cost £5m to construct.

During the ceremony, Mr Stoltenberg unlocked the vault before being joined by environmental campaigner Ms Maathai to place the first consignment of seeds in the -18C (0F) freezer.

When full, the vault will hold 4.5m samples - an estimated two billion seeds - from more than 100 countries around the world.

Tags: seed vault, arctic island, norway, disasters, doomsday, science

Wildfires force 250,000 to evacuate in California

Mon, 22 Oct 2007 22:10:23 GMT

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clipper's remarks: This is really tragic. I feel very sorry for Californians.

Clip Source: news.yahoo.com

Fast-moving wildfires raged across Southern California on Monday, forcing at least 250,000 people to flee their homes and destroying hundreds of buildings as desperate fire officials called for help from other states.

More than a dozen separate fires, driven by dry, gale-force Santa Ana winds, burned out of control across the drought-stricken southern half of the state, charring an estimated 200,000 acres, killing at least one person and injuring a number of others.

"It's a tragic time for California," said Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who declared a state of emergency in seven California counties.

The fires also forced closures of major state highways, schools and businesses and sent plumes of thick black smoke drifting across much of the state, blotting out the sun.

Two fires that merged north of the city of San Diego and scorched 14,000 acres prompted authorities to order 250,000 people evacuated from an area roughly 12 square miles

Tags: california, wildfires, united states

Greece declares state of emergency

Sun, 26 Aug 2007 01:21:48 GMT

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clipper's remarks: Reuters reports many people are still trapped in villages surrounded by the flames.

Clip Source: www.alertnet.org

The Greek government declared a state of emergency for the entire country on Saturday after forest fires killed at least 44 people in the southern Peloponnese region.

"All regions of the country are declared in a state of emergency in order to mobilise all means and forces to face this disaster," Greek Prime Minister Costas Karamanlis said in an address to the nation.

Scores of fires have swept through the Peloponnese and other regions since Friday, trapping hundreds in villages. Greece has asked its European Union partners for help.

"So many fire fronts in so many locations in the country can't be a coincidence," Karamanlis said. "The state will do its utmost to find the culprits and punish them.

"No one has the right to take human lives and destroy the environment ... to destroy our country."

Tags: greece, forest fire, disasters, state of emergency

Inferno in Greece

Sat, 25 Aug 2007 16:57:27 GMT

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clipper's remarks: Death toll is at least 44. It's like a nightmare.

Clip Source: news.bbc.co.uk

The speed with which the fire spread caught many people unawares

Greek emergency workers continue to find the charred bodies of people burned to death by forest fires that are raging in the south of the country.

Officials raised the death toll from the fires over the past two days to 44.

Searches of burnt cars, houses and fields were still turning up the remains of those who could not escape.

Prime Minister Kostas Karamanlis called the situation "an unspeakable tragedy". The government appealed for EU help and later declared a state of emergency.

Greek newspapers are calling the southern Peloponnese region a "crematorium", says the BBC's Malcolm Brabant in Athens.

The fires have been moving so fast that people have been cut off before they could escape. With emergency services overstretched, desperate residents and local officials called television and radio stations to appeal for help.

Tags: greece, forest fire, disasters

Dean 3rd Strongest Hurricane to Hit Land

Wed, 22 Aug 2007 03:12:14 GMT

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Clip Source: dsc.discovery.com

Aug. 21, 2007 — Hurricane Dean was the third-most intense Atlantic hurricane to make landfall since record keeping began in the 1850s, based on its central atmospheric pressure, forecasters said.

Dean was a top-scale Category 5 storm at landfall Tuesday on Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula. Its maximum sustained winds were 165 mph and gusts reached 200 mph. Just before landfall, a Global Positioning System device dropped from a hurricane hunter aircraft found it had a central pressure of 906 millibars, forecasters said.

Clip Source: dsc.discovery.com

Only three other Category 5 storms have been known to hit land: the 1935 hurricane, Hurricane Camille in 1969 and Hurricane Andrew in 1992. Andrew had top sustained winds of 165 mph at landfall. Andrew was the second-most expensive hurricane in U.S. history, after Hurricane Katrina.

Tags: hurricanes, tropical storms, hurricane dean, mexico, weather

Mexico coast braces for hurricane

Tue, 21 Aug 2007 00:24:53 GMT

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Clip Source: news.bbc.co.uk

Some people have been sheltering in local schools

Storm hits Jamaica

The Mexican authorities have evacuated tourist resorts and shut down off-shore oil facilities ahead of the potentially devastating arrival of Hurricane Dean.

Thousands of tourists attempted to leave the resort of Cancun, but some were unable to get a flight.

Neighbouring Belize is also bracing itself for the hurricane, which is registering winds of 150mph (240km/h).

Forecasters think Dean may get even stronger before it reaches Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula overnight.

The storm has already claimed at least six lives in the eastern Caribbean - but largely spared the Cayman islands earlier on Monday.

In Jamaica, it tore off roofs, uprooted trees and destroyed power lines as the storm's centre passed just south of the island.

Tags: hurricanes, tropical storms, mexico, hurricane dean

Devastating floods hit South Asia

Fri, 03 Aug 2007 15:28:45 GMT

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Clip Source: news.bbc.co.uk

Devastating floods hit South Asia

Surviving the floods

Almost 20 million people have been displaced as some of the worst floods for years have hit a wide swathe of northern India, Bangladesh and Nepal.

Roads have been washed away and hundreds of villages have been cut off by swollen rivers.

Almost 200 people have died in the floods in the last few days.

THE AFFECTED AREAS

India: 125 people killed and 12 million stranded, mostly in Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Assam

Bangladesh: 64 people have been killed and seven million are marooned

Nepal: Thousands of people displaced in the south

Worst-hit areas

Tags: climate, disasters, floods, asia

Rain killed more than 200 in Pakistan

Mon, 25 Jun 2007 03:27:17 GMT

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Clip Source: news.yahoo.com

KARACHI (Reuters) - Storms and torrential rain have killed more than 200 people in Pakistan's biggest city, Karachi, a provincial minister said on Sunday, and left angry residents without power.

"Now the total number of those killed because of rain is 228," provincial Health Minister Sardar Ahmed told Reuters. "These deaths are caused by electrocution, falling trees, house collapses and road accidents."

More bad weather is forecast for Pakistan and neighboring India, where dozens have died after prolonged downpours across the country in the last few days. Aid workers and military helicopters in India's southern state of Andhra Pradesh were battling on Sunday to provide food for 200,000 people displaced by monsoon floods.

Tags: weather, asia, rain, storm

Nine Hurricanes Forecast for Atlantic

Fri, 01 Jun 2007 17:03:28 GMT

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Clip Source: dsc.discovery.com

Nine Hurricanes Forecast for Atlantic

With the 2007 Atlantic hurricane season a few hours away, researcher William Gray released his newest forecast Thursday still showing an expectation for 17 named storms and nine hurricanes, five of them intense.

Gray, based at Colorado State University, described it as a very active season. He said there was a 74 percent chance of a major hurricane making landfall somewhere on the U.S. coast.

There is a 50 percent chance of a major hurricane making landfall on the East Coast, including the Florida Peninsula, according to the new forecast; the long-term average is 31 percent.

The chance of a major hurricane hitting the Gulf Coast between the Florida Panhandle and Brownsville, Texas, is 49 percent; the long-term average is 30 percent. There is also an above-average chance of a major hurricane making landfall in the Caribbean, according to the forecast.

Tags: hurricanes, tropical storms, atlantic

Hurricane Season Looking Busy

Thu, 24 May 2007 16:32:17 GMT

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Clip Source: dsc.discovery.com

Hurricane Season Looking Busy

May 22, 2007 — Government forecasters called for a busier than normal hurricane season Tuesday.

The National Weather Service forecasters said they expect 13 to 17 tropical storms, with seven to 10 of them becoming hurricanes.

The forecast follows that of two other leading storm experts in anticipating a busy season.

The likelihood of above normal hurricane activity is 75 percent, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said.

"With expectations for an active season, it is critically important that people who live in East and Gulf coastal areas as well as the Caribbean be prepared," said Bill Proenza director of the national hurricane center in Miami.

Tags: hurricanes, caribbean, east coast, tropical storms

20 dead as tornadoes hit Ga., Ala., Mo.

Fri, 02 Mar 2007 17:18:48 GMT

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clipper's remarks: Hope everyone is fine and alright in East and Midwest.

Clip Source: news.yahoo.com

ENTERPRISE, Ala. - A violent storm system ripped apart an Alabama high school as students hunkered inside and later tore through Georgia, hitting a hospital and raising the death toll to at least 20 across the Midwest and Southeast.

Clip Source: news.bbc.co.uk

US clean-up after lethal storms

A helicopter evacuates a student from Enterprise High School

Enlarge Image

Rescue efforts are under way in several states in America's south and mid-west after a series of tornadoes left at least 20 people dead.

Hardest hit was Alabama, where at least eight people died when a tornado struck a high school building on Thursday.

Nine more people died in Georgia, two of whom were killed when another tornado hit near a regional hospital.

The tornadoes were part of a major storm system that stretched across a swathe of the United States.

Further north, several mid-western states were hit by heavy snow and blizzards, which closed hundreds of miles of major roads.

Tags: storms, tornado, weather, disasters, america

Mud volcano floods Java

Tue, 29 Aug 2006 21:48:08 GMT

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Clip Source: www.nature.com

Mud volcano floods Java

Disaster-plagued Indonesian island faces new threat.

Residents carry their belongings through mud as they evacuate their homes in east Java.

TRISNADI/AP/EMPICS

For 3 months a sea of hot mud has been gushing from the ground in Sidoarjo, East Java, 35 kilometres south of Indonesia's second largest city, Surabaya. The steaming mud pool is growing at an estimated 50,000 cubic metres a day, accompanied by hydrogen sulphide gas, and now reportedly covers more than 25 square kilometres. The flow has not yet been stopped; thousands of people have lost their homes.

Tags: mud flood, java, indonesia

Floods turn desert into "sea"

Mon, 28 Aug 2006 14:14:13 GMT

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Clip Source: news.yahoo.com

Deadly floods in India turn desert area into "sea"

JAIPUR, India (Reuters) - Monsoon rains and flooding have killed at least 130 people in India's western state of Rajasthan, officials said on Monday, with huge swathes of desert underwater.

Tens of thousands of people have been displaced in Barmer, a sprawling district that borders Pakistan and is known for its sand dunes and widely spread villages. Dozens of people are missing.

"The desert looks like a sea. There is no place where one can walk," Captain Saurabh Modi, an army officer who is involved in relief operations in Barmer, told Reuters by telephone.

Hundreds of people marooned on sand dunes, surrounded by over 15 feet of water, were being rescued by military helicopters and motorized navy dinghies.

Most of the deaths in Rajasthan in the week-long flooding were caused by drowning and house collapses.

Tags: floods, monsoon, india, disasters

Ethiopia flood misery mounts

Sun, 20 Aug 2006 14:15:57 GMT

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clipper's remarks:

In addition to the confirmed deaths, some 250 people are missing and 73,000 are affected, many of them left homeless by the raging waters that have killed thousands of valuable livestock and flooded huge tracts of farmland.

Clip Source: news.yahoo.com

Ethiopia flood misery mounts as rains threaten dams

ADDIS ABABA (AFP) - Ethiopia braced for more damage from deadly nationwide flash floods as the government warned unusually heavy seasonal rains could force the release of water from dangerously swollen dams.

A task force set up to deal with flooding crises that have affected nearly 75,000 people said three dams in the west, south and north of the country were close to the breaking point and advised residents in their vicinities to leave.

Although controlled, it said the release of water from the threatened dams on the Omo, Awash and Blue Nile rivers could compound devastation from floods that have already killed at least 626 people in the south, east and north.

Tags: ethiopia, floods, weather, climate, disasters