Jimu news reporter Li Manying
Reuters reported on August 30 that several provinces in Pakistan have been hit by floods affected by monsoon rains, and 1136 people have been killed in the historic flood disaster, and it may take years for the country to recover.
So why is Pakistan at the forefront of the global climate crisis? Through combing, the Jimu news reporter found that this disaster had its inevitability by chance.
An old man waded through the water carrying a child
Rainfall is three times higher than the previous average
According to The New York Times, Pakistan received almost 3 times the country's average in 30 years during this period. Pakistan's climate change minister, Shirley Lehman, said Pakistan is experiencing its eighth monsoon rain cycle this year, compared to 3-4 cycles in previous years.
While the Indus River flows more abundantly and faster than usual from the north of the country, the southern provinces of Sindh and Balochistan are suffering from unprecedented rainfall. This year's rainfall in the southeastern province of Sindh is 784% of normal, compared with 522% in the southwestern province of Balochistan. The Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa mountains in the north were also hit hard by the same "monster monsoon", and none of Pakistan's four provinces were spared. Climate Minister Shirley Lehman recently tweeted: "Pakistan has never seen an uninterrupted monsoon cycle like this. ”
Sky News reported on Aug. 30 that as the monsoon season in June began earlier than usual, one-third of Pakistan's land had been submerged, entire villages had been washed away, crops had been destroyed, and people were desperately looking for higher places.
Glaciers are second only to the North and South Poles
Pakistan has a population of about 221 million. Most of the population lives along the Indus River, which originates in the Himalayas and flows through much of the country, all the way to the Arabian Sea.
Lakes formed by melting glaciers
During the monsoon season in July and August, the Indus River is prone to flooding. In the northern Himalayas, Pakistan has the largest number of glaciers in the world outside the Arctic and Antarctic, with a total of about 7,000.
Affected by global warming, temperatures in The city of Navabsha reached nearly 50 degrees Celsius (122 degrees Fahrenheit) earlier this year. Glaciers melt and form glacial lakes, with about 3,000 new lakes emerging. When a glacier alone melted, it released millions of cubic meters of water, triggering landslides and destroying a bridge, two power plants and hundreds of homes in the Hunza Valley.
In May, a glacial lake in the Hunza Valley in northern Pakistan collapsed, triggering massive flooding, forming several new lakes around it, increasing the volume of water by 40 percent in 20 days and expanding its area by 15 percent over the previous month, according to pakistani media outlet Tribune Letters.
In Pakistan's Gilgit-Burtistan region and Khyber Pashtun province, high temperatures have caused glaciers to melt to form more than 3,000 glacial lakes, 33 of which could collapse at any time, releasing millions of cubic meters of water and debris in a matter of hours, meaning that 7.1 million people may have been affected by the glacial lake rupture flood.
According to Al Jazeera, Pakistan has experienced at least 16 high-temperature-related glacial lake rupture floods during the year, up from an average of just five or six per year.
Preventive infrastructure needs to be added
According to the Global Environmental Risk Index published by the NGO Germanwatch, Pakistan is the eighth most vulnerable country in the world to extreme climates caused by climate change. The United Nations Development Programme has also said that Pakistan is at increasing risk of a range of climate disasters such as heat waves, droughts, floods and melting glaciers under the influence of climate change.
Roads damaged by flooding
In the aftermath of the floods, many Pakistanis and climate change activists argued that the government ignored the urgency of the crisis and did not build enough preventive infrastructure. The United Nations Development Programme also noted that Pakistan has failed to provide up-to-date information on glacier changes, making potential disasters difficult to predict.
Previously, many of Pakistan's newly formed glacial lakes became tourist attractions, and some developers built hotels near areas with high risk of flooding and on the banks of swollen rivers, Sky News reported.
Pakistan is expected to have more rainfall in September, however. Climate Change Minister Ms Lehman told Sky News: "The country absolutely does not have the capacity to accommodate more water. ”
Environmental scientists at Peshawar University said the country would see more extreme weather events and suggested strengthening planning to combat climate change in regulations and policies, "Without planning, we will encounter the same problems in the future." ”
At present, Pakistan has some external investment in combating extreme climate change. In the Gilgit-Baltistan and Khyber Pukhtunkhwa mountains, the UN Green Climate Fund has funded better early warning systems, 50 weather stations across 24 valleys, and better irrigation systems that directly benefit 700,000 people.
(Source: Jimu News)
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