We're in an el nino year where an unusual southern Pacific warming causes a lot of freak weather throughout the Pacific Rim. The phenomenon often heralds intense weather changes, particularly rainfall and the associated landslides and flooding.
Indonesia's capital, Jakarta, is in the throes of some of the worst flooding ever seen. It's estimated that 340,000 people have been forced from their homes. The rains behind this are expected to continue for another two weeks.
Muddy flood waters already reaching 13-feet in some areas are expected to continue to rise and many Indonesians remain trapped in homes they refused to leave. It is estimated that tens of thousands of homes have been inundated.
What this spells is a severe, long-term problem for Indonesia and the people of Jakarta. This sort of environmentally-driven, mass migration puts unbearable strain on infrastructure, particularly sanitation, that can lead to outbreaks of dysentery and other diseases. With the road system crippled, boats have to be relied upon to deliver emergency water and food supplies.
Jakarta is a city of marked contrasts. Much of it is modern and very Western but it also has incredible slum neighbourhoods, the areas particularly vulnerable to floods.
2 comments:
el nino rather ante dates the CO2 emissions around which so much climate change hysteria revolves.
It is believed that el nino has been a naturally occuring phenomenon for centuries at least. That's not to say that it and global warming are mutually exclusive, they're not. One can build on the other. Over the past two decades el ninos have become more frequent and, this year in particular, more intense. This is not about "climate change hysteria" but about an increasing problem.
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