china flood death tool 1,072. 619 people(aprox) missing

China's worst flooding in more than a decade has killed nearly 1,000 people across the country and stranded tens of thousands in the northeast without power.
The state-run flood control office said 968 people have been killed since the rainy beginning of the year and 507 others are missing.More heavy rains were expected for the southeast, southwest and northeast parts of the country through Thursday.About 30,000 residents in Kouqian town were trapped in their homes after torrential rains drenched the northeastern province of Jilin on Wednesday, the official Xinhua news agency reported.Water began flooding the town after the nearby Xingshan Reservoir and the Wende and Songhua rivers overflowed. Rescuers were delivering supplies by boat and moving people to higher ground.In Jilin city in Jilin province, workers were busy recovering thousands of barrels of chemicals that had tumbled into the Songhua River after a flood swept through a local factory."The worry this year has been on the dams and the reservoirs ... This year it's been so much extra rainfall, about 15 per cent more than usual. "That complicates the situation because the reservoirs are getting full and the dams are nearing their maximum capacity."Flooding has hit areas all over China. A total of 875,000 homes have collapsed and almost 10 million people have been evacuated, according to Xinhua.The Three Gorges Dam, the world's largest hydroelectric project, has reached 90 per cent of its full capacity.Thousands of workers have sandbagged riverbanks and checked reservoirs in preparation for potential floods expected to flow from the swollen Yangtze and Han rivers, an official with the Yangtze Water Resources Commission, said.
"Right now, the Han river in Hubei province is on the verge breaching warning levels".The Han is expected to rise this week to its highest level in two decades.Workers were prepared to blast holes in the river's embankment to divert flood waters into a low-lying area of farms and fish ponds, Xinhua said.
The toll in floods triggered by torrential rains in China this year has reached 1,072, while 619 people are still missing.The floods have affected over 140 million people in 28 provinces and caused economic losses estimated at almost 210 billion yuan, said Shu Qingpeng, deputy director of the Office of State Flood Control and Drought Relief.Floods also destroyed over 1.1 million homes and damaged 9.72 million hectares of farmland.Rivers like the Yangtze, the Yellow and the Songhua were all swollen to danger levels after heavy rains. Authorities have evacuated 10.42 million people this year from areas at risk of flooding.

most severe flood in history "climate change" natural disaster policy

“In fact Pakistan is among the few developing countries which has prepared such a comprehensive national policy on a subject which is on top of the global priority agenda may be after war on terror,” said Dr Qamaruzaman Chaudhary, former director general of Meteorological Department of Pakistan and leading author of the policy.The policy draft has already been accepted by the country’s Ministry of Environment and is ready for the cabinet’s approval.
In 2008, the Climate Change Task Force was formed for the policy draft. Some 40 experts from different but related fields strived for two years to finalise it. The task force also consulted federal and provincial agencies, organisations and other experts.The country has diverse ecosystems which include coastlines, deserts, arid zones, mountains and glaciers. These areas are in danger due to population growth, lack of planning and mismanagement.
For Pakistan, climate change is a reality as data of temperature from the last 100 years shows a visible increase in heat. It is also among the top countries vulnerable to climate change.“Particularly, during the last two decades, extreme weather events like heavy rains, heat and droughts have increased,” Chaudhary said.This pattern of extreme weather could be noticed in Thar. The region is an arid zone where drought arrives after every three years, and may stay put for 12 months or more.But there is a harsh twist in this pattern: the third drought in the cycle tends to be longer and more severe than the first two and parches the land for three years. This triggers the mass migration of locals to the other green areas.The main objective of the policy is to sustain economic growth by addressing the challenges of climate change.The sectors of water resources, agriculture, human health, forestry, biodiversity and others are also among the top priorities along with the areas of mountains, pastures, marine and coastal eco-systems. The policy is to also to be integrated by other related policies.“The policy is a multi-sector approach in which the long term project will come under the National Climate Change Action Plane – a road map for adaptation and mitigation of serious problems,” said Jawed Ali Khan, Director General (Environment) at the Ministry of Environment.
The policy also stressed upon the importance of learning, training, technical, and capacity building approach. These targets are to be achieved by awareness, national and international cooperation, technology transfer and funding.Chaudhary has confirmed an action plan as the next step and hoped it will be ready within next few months.The policy also needs immediate implementation because the country faced extreme floods in 2010 in which 2,000 people died, 20 million were displaced and one-fifth of the country was under water.The upper margin of the country is dotted with glaciers and mountains which serve as water towers for the country. Pakistan has already been observing snow liquefy floods – without any rain – and melting glaciers. Thus the threat of extreme monsoons could also occur in future.The GCISC, a research center for climate change, also contributed to the policy draft.The US based Pakistani Director of the Frederick S. Pardee Cener for the Study of Longer- Range Future and author of IPCC report, Dr. Adil Najam has welcomed Pakistan’s first policy draft on climate change.
“I think what the draft says is correct, but may already have been said in a whole host of other policy documents. The challenge is to turn the general statements into specific targets and timetables,” said Najam.“Good policy should also be rooted in the specific priorities and contexts of the nation. From this standpoint, it seems to be that any climate change policy for Pakistan has to confront the energy issues, especially in the context of constant load-shedding.

JAPAN EARTHQUAKE TSUNAMI IS VERY POWERFULL........

The magnitude-8.9 quake struck at 2:46 p.m. local time and was the biggest to hit Japan since record-keeping began in the late 1800s. It ranked as the fifth-largest earthquake in the world since 1900 and was nearly 8,000 times stronger than one that devastated Christchurch, New Zealand, last month, scientists said.The quake shook dozens of cities and villages along a 1,300-mile (2,100-kilometer) stretch of coast and tall buildings swayed in Tokyo, hundreds of miles from the epicenter. Prime Minister Naoto Kan was attending a parliamentary session at the time.Large fishing boats and other vessels rode the high waves ashore, slamming against overpasses or scraping under them and snapping power lines along the way. A fleet of partially submerged cars bobbed in the water. Ships anchored in ports crashed against each other.The tsunami roared over embankments, washing anything in its path inland before reversing direction and carrying the cars, homes and other debris out to sea. Flames shot from some of the homes, apparently from burst gas pipes.
Waves of muddy waters flowed over farms near Sendai, carrying buildings, some of them ablaze. Drivers attempted to flee. The tarmac at Sendai's airport was inundated with thick, muddy debris that included cars, trucks, buses and even light planes.Highways to the worst-hit coastal areas buckled. Telephone lines snapped. Train service was suspended in northeastern Japan and in Tokyo, which normally serves 10 million people a day. Untold numbers of people were stranded in stations or roaming the streets. Tokyo's Narita airport was closed indefinitely.Police said 200-300 bodies were found in Sendai, although the official casualty toll was 185 killed, 741 missing and 948 injured. A ship with 80 dock workers was swept away from a shipyard in Miyagi. All on the ship was believed to be safe, although the vessel had sprung a leak and was taking on some water, Japan's coast guard said. Officials declared the first-ever state of emergency at a Japanese nuclear power plant and ordered evacuations after the earthquake knocked out power to a cooling system at the Fukushima Daiichi facility near the city of Onahama, about 170 miles (270 kilometers) northeast of Tokyo. They said radiation levels inside the facility had surged to 1,000 times more than normal. Some radiation had seeped outside the plant, the nuclear safety agency said early Saturday, prompting calls for more evacuations of the area. Some 3,000 people have already been urged to leave their homes.The group watched homes and vehicles carried away in the wave and found their hotel mostly destroyed when they reached it. A large fire erupted at the Cosmo oil refinery in the city of Ichihara and burned out of control with 100-foot (30-meter) flames whipping into the sky. Also in Miyagi prefecture, a fire broke out in a turbine building of a nuclear power plant, but it was later extinguished, said Tohoku Electric Power Co.Japanese automakers Toyota, Nissan and Honda halted production at some assembly plants in areas hit by the quake. One worker was killed and more than 30 injured after being crushed by a collapsing wall at a Honda Motor Co. research facility in northeastern Tochigi prefecture, the company said. Jesse Johnson, a native of Nevada who lives in Chiba, north of Tokyo, was eating at a sushi restaurant with his wife when the quake hit. Tokyo was brought to a near standstill. Tens of thousands of people were stranded with the rail network down, and the streets were jammed with cars, buses and trucks trying to get out of the city. The city set up 33 shelters in city hall, on university campuses and in government offices, but many planned to spend the night at 24-hour cafes, hotels and offices. Jefferies International Ltd., a global investment banking group, estimated overall losses of about $10 billion. The tsunami hit Hawaii before dawn Friday, with most damage coming on the Big Island. The waves covered beachfront roads and rushed into hotels. One house was picked up and carried out to sea. Low-lying areas in Maui were flooded by 7-foot waves. On the U.S. mainland, marinas and harbors in California and Oregon bore the brunt of the damage, estimated by authorities to be in the millions of dollars. Boats crashed into each other in marines and some vessels were washed out to sea. Rescue crews were searching for a man who was swept away in northern California while taking pictures. Two people with him tried to rescue him, although they were able to return to shore. Thousands fled homes in Indonesia after officials warned of a tsunami up to 6 feet (2 meters) high, but waves of only 4 inches (10 centimeters) were measured. No big waves came to the Northern Mariana Islands, a U.S. territory, either. Islands across the South Pacific were hit by bigger than normal waves, but no major damage was reported. Surges up to 26 inches (66 centimeters) high were reported in American Samoa, Nauru, Saipan and at the far northern tip of New Zealand. The quake struck at a depth of six miles (10 kilometers), about 80 miles (125 kilometers) off Japan's east coast, the USGS said. The area is 240 miles (380 kilometers) northeast of Tokyo. Several quakes hit the same region in recent days, including one measured at magnitude 7.3 on Wednesday that caused no damage. Japan's worst previous quake was a magnitude 8.3 in Kanto that killed 143,000 people in 1923, according to USGS. A 7.2-magnitude quake in Kobe killed 6,400 people in 1995. Japan lies on the "Ring of Fire"  an arc of earthquake and volcanic zones stretching around the Pacific where about 90 percent of the world's quakes occur, including the one that triggered the Dec. 26, 2004, Indian Ocean tsunami that killed an estimated 230,000 people in 12 countries. A magnitude-8.8 temblor that shook central Chile in February 2010 also generated a tsunami and killed 524 people.

TOKYO JAPAN EARTHQUAKE :

For more than two terrifying, seemingly endless minutes Friday, the most powerful earthquake ever recorded in Japan shook apart homes and buildings, cracked open highways and unnerved even those who have learned to live with swaying skyscrapers. Then came a devastating tsunami that slammed into northeastern Japan and killed hundreds of people.
The violent wall of water swept away houses, cars and ships. Fires burned out of control. Power to a cooling system at a nuclear power plant was knocked out, forcing thousands to flee. A boat was caught in the vortex of a whirlpool at sea.
The death toll rose steadily throughout the day, but the true extent of the disaster was not known because roads to the worst-hit areas were washed away or blocked by debris and airports were closed.
Aerial scenes of the town of Ofunato showed homes and warehouses in ruins. Sludge and high water spread over acres of land, with people seeking refuge on roofs of partially submerged buildings. At one school, a large white "SOS" had been spelled out in English.
President Barack Obama pledged U.S. assistance following what he called a potentially "catastrophic" disaster. He said one U.S. aircraft carrier is already in Japan and a second was on its way. A U.S. ship was also heading to the Marianas Islands to assist as needed, he added.

Tokyo japan nuclear plant

TOKYO: The operator of the crippled nuclear power plant leaking radiation in northern Japan announced a plan Sunday that would bring the crisis under control within six to nine months and allow evacuated residents to return to their homes.The phased road map for ending the crisis at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant, announced by Tokyo Electric Power Co. chairman Tsunehisa Katsumata at a news conference, includes plans to cover the damaged reactor buildings to contain the radiation and eventually remove the nuclear fuel.Frustrations have been mounting over TEPCO’s failure to resolve the nuclear crisis more than a month after a catastrophic earthquake and tsunami hit Japan on March 11, knocking out power and cooling systems at the Fukushima Dai-ichi complex.
In the first three months of the plan, the company hopes to steadily reduce the level of leaking radiation, Katsumata said. Three to six months after that, it hopes to get the release of radioactive materials under control.
”We would like to see evacuees return to their homes as early as possible,” Katsumata said.
The company is focusing on cooling the reactors and spent fuel pools, decontaminating water that has been contaminated by radiation, mitigating the release of radiation into the atmosphere and soil, and measuring and reducing the amount of radiation affecting the evacuation area, he said.TEPCO Vice President Sakae Muto said that in addition to covering the reactor buildings, the company will also work with authorities to decontaminate areas affected by the radiation.In a show of support for a staunch American ally, US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton expressed admiration and sympathy for the Japanese as she visited Tokyo on Sunday.
”We pledge our steadfast support for you and your future recovery. We are very confident that Japan will demonstrate the resilience that we have seen during this crisis in the months ahead,” Clinton told reporters after meeting with Foreign Minister Takeaki Matsumoto.

tokyo:nuclear power plant leaking

TOKYO: The operator of the crippled nuclear power plant leaking radiation in northern Japan announced a plan Sunday that would bring the crisis under control within six to nine months and allow evacuated residents to return to their homes.The phased road map for ending the crisis at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant, announced by Tokyo Electric Power Co. chairman Tsunehisa Katsumata at a news conference, includes plans to cover the damaged reactor buildings to contain the radiation and eventually remove the nuclear fuel.Frustrations have been mounting over TEPCO’s failure to resolve the nuclear crisis more than a month after a catastrophic earthquake and tsunami hit Japan on March 11, knocking out power and cooling systems at the Fukushima Dai-ichi complex.
In the first three months of the plan, the company hopes to steadily reduce the level of leaking radiation, Katsumata said. Three to six months after that, it hopes to get the release of radioactive materials under control.
”We would like to see evacuees return to their homes as early as possible,” Katsumata said.
The company is focusing on cooling the reactors and spent fuel pools, decontaminating water that has been contaminated by radiation, mitigating the release of radiation into the atmosphere and soil, and measuring and reducing the amount of radiation affecting the evacuation area, he said.TEPCO Vice President Sakae Muto said that in addition to covering the reactor buildings, the company will also work with authorities to decontaminate areas affected by the radiation.In a show of support for a staunch American ally, US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton expressed admiration and sympathy for the Japanese as she visited Tokyo on Sunday.
”We pledge our steadfast support for you and your future recovery. We are very confident that Japan will demonstrate the resilience that we have seen during this crisis in the months ahead,” Clinton told reporters after meeting with Foreign Minister Takeaki Matsumoto.

jakarta:worlds biggest nuclear plant

The skeleton of what will soon be one of the world’s biggest nuclear plants is slowly taking shape along China’s southeastern coast right on the doorstep of Hong Kong’s bustling metropolis.Three other facilities nearby are up and running or under construction.Like Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi plant they lie within a few hundred miles (kilometers) of the type of fault known to unleash the largest tsunami spawning earthquakes.Called subduction zones, these happen when one tectonic plate is lodged beneath another. And because the so-called Manila Trench hasn’t been the source of a huge quake in at least 440 years, some experts say tremendous stresses are building, increasing the chances of a major rupture.Should that happen, the four plants in southern China, and a fifth perched on Taiwan’s southern tip, could be in the path of a towering wave like the one that struck Fukushima.But China, Taiwan, India and several other countries frantically building coastal facilities have made little use of new science to determine whether these areas are safe. At least 32 plants in operation or under construction in Asia are at risk of one day being hit by a tsunami, nuclear experts and geologists warn.And even when nations have conducted appropriate seismic hazard assessments, in many cases they have not shared the findings with the UN International Atomic Energy Agency, leaving experts frustrated and in the dark.In assessing the tsunami risks to nuclear power stations, scientists focus on their proximity to subduction faults, volcanoes and areas frequently hit by underwater landslides all of which can trigger seismic waves. Because giant tsunamis recur, they also look at historic and scientific records, going back up to 4,000 years if possibleThe greatest threat comes from the subduction faults crisscrossing the globe, some far from the minds of policymakers, nuclear industry officials and the public because it has been so long since they exploded.In places where tectonic plates that form these faults are ”coupled,” or stuck together, the stresses are the biggest, especially if centuries have passed without a major energy releasing earthquake.When the strain eventually forces one plate to pop up or dive under the other, the resulting temblor can spawn mammoth waves like the one that struck off Japan’s northeast coast on March 11, triggering the nuclear crisis that has carried on for more than a month.While there is some ”coupling” at the Manila Trench, there is debate about just how much. Scientists say more research needs to be done to determine if pressure is building and along which segments.A computerized simulation by Yuen’s students shows a magnitude-9.0 quake along the Manila Trench sending waves racing along the South China Sea, before slamming Taiwan’s southern shore 15 minutes later. The tsunami reaches China’s southeast coast in around two hours. It also strikes Hong Kong, which sits just 30 miles from the nearest nuclear plant close enough to see increased radiation levels if a plant were to be damaged by a Fukushima-like event.
Scientists paint a worst-case scenario in which waves 15 to 24 feet high (5 to 8 meters) could strike the plants in China and Taiwan.Science has come a long way since the first nuclear plant was built in the 1950s.By carbon dating the ash, pollen or other organic material attached to tsunami sand deposits swept inland with the giant walls of water, geologists can determine to the decade, and sometimes even the year, when the wave hit and how big it was when it roared ashore.
That’s important because some tsunamis only strike once a millennium.