Wild Weather

[Shammu]

Hundreds Flee Flooding in Iowa City

Sunday , June 15, 2008

AP
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IOWA CITY, Iowa  —
A week's work of frantic sandbagging by students, professors and the National Guard couldn't spare this bucolic college town from the surging Iowa River, which has swamped more than a dozen campus buildings and forced the evacuation Sunday of hundreds of nearby homes.

The swollen river, which bisects this city of about 60,000 residents, was topping out at about 31.5 feet — a foot and a half below earlier predictions. But it still posed a lingering threat, and wasn't expected to begin receding until Monday night.

"I'm focused on what we can save," University of Iowa President Sally Mason said as she toured her stricken campus. "We'll deal with this when we get past the crisis. We're not past the crisis yet."

The university said 16 buildings had been flooded, including one designed by acclaimed architect Frank O. Gehry, and said others were at risk.

Click here to see uReport photos.

Iowa City Mayor Regenia Bailey said 500 to 600 homes were ordered to evacuate and hundreds of others were under a voluntary evacuation order through the morning. The city had no estimate of the number of homes that had actually flooded.

Bailey said homeowners will not be allowed back until the city determines it's safe.
Gov. Chet Culver said it was "a little bit of good news" that the river had crested, but cautioned that the situation was still precarious.

"Just because a river crests does not mean it's not a serious situation," he said. "You're still talking about a very, very dangerous public safety threat."

Elsewhere, state officials girded for serious flooding threats in Burlington and southeast Iowa including Fort Madison and Keokuk. Officials said 500 National Guard troops had already been sent to Burlington, a Mississippi River town of about 27,000, and some people were being evacuated.

Culver said the southeastern part of the state was likely to "see major and serious flooding on every part of the southeastern border of our state from New Boston and down."

In Cedar Rapids — where flooding had forced the evacuation of about 24,000 people from their homes — residents waited hours to get their first up-close look since flooding hammered most of the city earlier this week.

Some grew angry after long waits to pass through checkpoints. Cedar Rapids officials also were inspecting homes for possible electrical and structural hazards.

"It's stupid," said Vince Fiala, who said he waited for hours before police allowed him to walk five blocks to his house. "People are down on their knees and they're kicking them in the teeth."

The city's municipal water system was back to 50 percent of capacity Sunday, a big victory after three of the city's four drinking water collection wells were contaminated by murky, petroleum-laden floodwater. That contamination had left only about 15 million gallons a day for the city of more than 120,000 and the suburbs that depend on its water system.

After much of the University of Iowa's Arts Campus flooded in 1993, raised walkways were installed that doubled as berms. But those were quickly overwhelmed by the Iowa River's rising waters.

Standing beside the grayish water surrounding the limestone and stainless steel Iowa Advanced Technologies Laboratories, designed by Gehry, Mason choked up.

"I got tears in my eyes when I saw what was happening here," she said.

Across the river, Art Building West was surrounded by a lagoon of murky water. Designed by Steve Holl, it was one of only 11 buildings in the world recognized last year by the American Institute of Architects, said Rod Lehnertz, director of campus and facilities planning.

The damage would have been worse had it not been for the Herculean efforts of students, faculty, National Guard troops and others who swarmed the campus over several days to erect miles of sandbag walls, some as high as 9 feet.
On Saturday alone, volunteers filled and installed more than 100,000 sandbags, Lehnertz said.

Lehnertz was confident that buildings that hadn't flooded by Sunday were well-protected. He said the most pressing issue was flooding in the six miles of underground tunnels that feed steam to campus buildings for power. Workers pumped water from the tunnels into the streets and down toward the river.

Some buildings at the Arts Campus on the river's west bank had as much as 8 feet of water inside.

All elective and non-emergency procedures were canceled at the university hospital, and non-critical patients were discharged, Mason said. Nurses were brought in from elsewhere to ensure all emergency shifts would be covered.
Bruce Brown, 64, a retired radiology professor at University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics, spent three days filling sandbags on the east bank. But picturesque brick Danforth Chapel, where his daughter was married, flooded anyway.
"When I think about moving rare books from the bottom of the library, I weep," he said. But then he joked about pulling sandbag duty with a hulking Hawkeye football player.

"I weigh 129, he weighs about 300 pounds," he said. "He would ship these thing that were like dead bodies to me. But that was fine. We worked together and got it done."

Elsewhere in the Midwest, hundreds of members of the Illinois National Guard headed to communities along the swollen Mississippi River on Sunday for sandbagging duty while emergency management officials eyed rain-swollen rivers across the state.

Two levees broke Saturday near the Mississippi River town of Keithsburg, Ill., flooding the town of 700 residents about 35 miles southwest of Moline. The National Weather Service said the Mississippi would crest Tuesday morning near Keithsburg at 25.1 feet. Flood stage in the area is 14 feet. Rising water threatening approaches also prompted Illinois officials to close a Mississippi River bridge at Quincy.

Hundreds Flee Flooding in Iowa City

[Shammu]

Tropical storm floods southern Taiwan, killing 7

Fri Jul 18, 6:46 AM ET

TAIPEI, Taiwan - Tropical storm Kalmaegi lashed southern Taiwan with torrential rains Friday, triggering flash floods and landslides. Rampaging waters killed at least seven people and washed six others away.

Television footage showed water pouring down a mountain road, flooding a large area of Kaohsiung county in southern Taiwan. The Disaster Relief Center said a woman was rescued from a house buried in a landslide, but her 1-year-old daughter and a brother died.

A soldier was killed after falling into a drainage ditch in Taichung, central Taiwan, the center said.

Four people drowned and four others were washed away by flood waters in Kaohsiung and Tainan, also in southern Taiwan, the center said.

A man and a woman were missing after the police motorboat that rescued them from their home overturned in flood waters in Tainan county, it said. Three rescuers were pulled from the waters unharmed, it said.

Water supplies were cut in the county for more than 650,000 households because of flooding, officials said.

Television showed firefighters using ladders to rescue several people trapped in a flooded house in coastal Yunlin county, and several drivers being rescued after hollering for help on top of their trucks in a flooded freeway in Taichung.

Officials said parts of the south had recorded up to 44 inches of rain in the past 24 hours.

The storm started lashing Taiwan late Thursday. It headed away from Taiwan and toward southern China early Friday, packing winds of 52 mph, the Central Weather Bureau said.

In the Philippines, the government disaster agency said two people died earlier this week as the storm pounded the country's northern corner with rain and strong winds.

Kalmaegi is the Korean word for sea gull.

Tropical storm floods southern Taiwan, killing 7

[Shammu]

Storms and floods in Ukraine kill 13, 2 missing

Sun Jul 27, 7:12 AM ET

KIEV, Ukraine - Ukraine's Emergency Ministry says storms and floods have killed 13 people, including five children, and at least two more are missing.

It says four days of storms have flooded more than 20,000 houses and cut electricity in four western regions. More than 8,000 people have been evacuated, and thousands are in serious danger as the water keeps rising Sunday.

"Ukraine has not seen anything like that in 100 years," First Deputy Prime Minister Oleksandr Turchinov was quoted by the Interfax news agency as saying.

President Viktor Yushchenko and Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko have rushed to the area.

Storms and floods in Ukraine kill 13, 2 missing

[Soldier4Christ]

Snow Greets Visiting Hikers at Mount Rainier

Cool ocean temperatures in the southern Pacific Ocean—a phenomenon known as La Nina—chilled sunny expectations this summer for thousands of visitors to Mount Rainier National Park. Those who arrived here in July planning to backpack or hike its famous sub-alpine wildflower meadows found snow instead, six feet in places, though sunny daytime temperatures reach into the 70s.

The popular mountain that draws 1.5 million visitors each year received 950 inches of snow last winter, 300 inches more than its 650-inch average. Park officials said a cooler than usual spring also pushed back the thaw. “A lot of people were disappointed to come and find snowy meadows,” said Mike Punches, a park interpreter at the Henry M. Jackson Visitor Center at Paradise, located 5,400 feet above sea level. “Normally the wildflower season is all of July and August. The early bloomers come the first of July.

Areas that feature the avalanche lily are limited to certain parts of the mountain."I led wildflower hikes in June on 10 feet of snow. They weren’t listed that way. We shifted them to ecology hikes about life on Rainier, and what it takes to adapt here.” Climate officials said the Pacific Northwest snowpack is the heaviest it has been since 1999. That’s when the last La Nina event occurred. Deep snows remain throughout the region affecting the Olympic and North Cascade mountain ranges along with portions of Oregon, Idaho and British Columbia.

“The main driver is a strong La Nina,” said Dave Garen, hydrologist for the National Water and Climate Center in Portland Oregon, part of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The agency monitors mountain snowpack for its water content, predicting river flow volumes for agricultural use.

[Soldier4Christ]

Global warming, yeah right, it’s cold!

North Island nearby Vancouver, British Columbia.

Well “Juneuary” is long over up here and we finally had a bit of sun in July.

Never had I seen a colder spring. Last year was bad enough. Two springs in a row that “frosted the pumpkin” so to speak.

Utility bills not a whole lot different than winter even! And thanks to Gordo Campbell’s “Save the Earth by sticking it to the taxpayer” philosophy which has brought down not one, but two separate energy taxes complete with wasteful bureaucracy gobbling it all up, the provincial government is even more pocket-emptying than before.

Enough of that. I even burnt all of my firewood the last two years for the very first time. Global warming my ...  – more like a fulfillment of the old “Nuclear Winter” theory I’d say. That without the bombs even going off!

So I finally got around to getting the firewood and am left wondering how soon the government is gonna get us there? Sooner rather than later I’d guess.

Anyhow, here the Newfie neighbour gal is walking by and says as I’m splitting the timber, “Once you get yer summer firewood in, you can start on your winter wood!”

Newfies tell it like it is!

This spring was just a horrific extension of winter says me. And as if I need further proof I goes down to the Marble River in mid-July for a swim.

Well, the toes were tingling and the hairs on my legs were standing up – even under the water! And then I hit waist deep.

By golly the family jewels shot up so high I looked like I had two Adam’s apples for a while, eh? Couple of icebergs could have floated by and it probably would have warmed her up a bit!

Yes sir, Newfie Bob said it best, “Ever since they started babbling about this global warming theory I haven’t been warm since!”

But my kid and others tell us different, “That’s all part of global warming too Dad,” he says.

I say that’s a pretty indestructible theory to be sure. No doubt we are all gonna freeze to death from global warming.

That’s what they’ll write down in history they will. I just hope that ol’ Suzuki and Gore start prophesying about global cooling sometime soon cause then sure as heck, we’ll have a heat wave that will warm us up real fine like we both want and need.

Suzuki and Gore should have lived in Old Testament times I figures. When you prophesied back then in Hebrew Land, you had to deliver or you would get a free ticket to a very painful sort of rock concert where you were both the star and would also soon be seeing stars!

[Soldier4Christ]

Rare Snow in Australia

Snow in Queensland, soft hail or snow in Sydney and icy delays in Adelaide. It has snowed in Queensland, and it will pay to rug up because even colder weather is expected tomorrow. Snow, sleet, wind and rain ripped through the state’s Granite Belt and southern Darling Downs, bringing freezing conditions yesterday. See photos here. The big chill was felt across virtually all over the eastern seaboard and the ski fields at Perisher in the New South Wales Snowy Mountains enjoyed a 15cm dump of snow.

Meanwhile, one of Adelaide’s coldest mornings forced the delay of flights yesterday as ice formed on the wings of planes. Adelaide Airport managing director Phil Baker said up to 400 passengers were due to leave about 7am but their flights were delayed until about 8.15am, when the air temperature increased. For Adelaide it was the coldest temperature since 1982.

Yesterday, Granite Belt Wine Country marketing director Michele Cozzi said snow was reported at Eukey, south of Stanthorpe, and at Sugarloaf Forest to the east while sleet was recorded at Stanthorpe, Glen Aplin and Applethorpe.

And the ground turned white in Sydney. It looked like snow, and it felt like snow, but in what may come as a disappointment to Sydneysiders, today’s winter whiteness was just soft hail. Just after 3.30pm (AEST) this afternoon the area around Lindfield, Roseville and Killara became blanketed in white as a thunderstorm brought a winter wonderland to parts of northern Sydney. It’s given a very European feel to Roseville,” one Roseville woman told the Seven Network. “I think the snow here is better than Perisher,” a man from the same suburb told the ABC. But despite some hope that metropolitan Sydney had experienced its first recorded snowfall since 1836, the Bureau of Meteorology said northern Sydney had just been blanketed in hail. “It was soft hail,” senior forecaster Peter Zmijewski said.

As an emailer said some of the places where snow fell were the equivalent of a snow in Buenos Aires as they experienced last year for the first time in many years.

[Shammu]

Mideast Drought and Syrian Wheat Harvest Failure
4 days ago
Mideast Drought and Fall in Syrian Wheat Harvest

The wheat harvest is in across Syria and the Middle East and the situation looks grim

The most recent Syrian estimates place the harvest at 2 million metric tons - less than half the 4.1 million ton harvest of 2007, and the 2007 harvest was almost 1 million tons below a peak harvest.

The culprit is a devastating drought that has left soil dry and dusty. The early stages of the drought affected the 2007 harvest and it has now intensified and decimated the 2008 Syrian harvest. The strength of the drought increases eastward towards the Iraqi border. Everywhere here precipitation has been less than 50 % of normal. Even weeds are sparse in dry empty fields.

The drought is also affecting pasture lands putting pressure on the Bedouin and their sheep. In Syria both shepherds and farmers face an uncertain future. Irrigation has helped in some cases, but less that 50% of fields are irrigated and irrigation water often disappears in the dry winds. In addition, groundwater and reservoir supplies are under pressure, some reservoirs are now mere puddles compared to their former capacity.

Even the mighty Euphrates is not immune to the drought, discharge has decreased and pumps run incessantly drawing water from the river. Syria has promised to aid Iraqi farmers with releases of water, but by the time the flow reaches the border the salt content has doubled.

Syria with its growing and increasingly urbanized population has only months of emergency wheat stores left and for the first time in 15 years is resorting to purchases on the international market - a market that is becoming increasingly expensive.

SImilar declining harvests due to drought in Turkey, Lebanon, Iran are dirving those countries to purchases on the international market, In Syria and throughout the Middle East, an old enemy, drought, is again challenging an ancient and troubled region.

Mideast Drought and Syrian Wheat Harvest Failure

[Shammu]

62 dead in Vietnam floods

Sat Aug 9, 6:19 AM ET

HANOI, Vietnam - Landslides and floods killed at least 62 people in northern Vietnam, covering the homes of some victims as they slept in their beds, disaster officials said Saturday.

Dozens more were reported missing and officials feared the death toll would rise as they struggled to reach isolated communities. With heavy rain continuing Saturday, rescue workers were trying to move people to higher ground.

The province of Lao Cai was the hardest hit, with 25 people reported dead and 35 missing, said provincial disaster official Thao A Tua. Tens of thousands were stranded by the floods, which began Friday, Tua said.

"The death toll is likely to increase because heavy rain is still falling and the rivers in the area are rising," Tua said.

In neighboring Yen Bai province, floods and landslides killed 25 people and torrents carried some people miles (kilometers) from their homes, said disaster official Luong Tuan Anh. Four people were still missing, he said.

"The water and walls of mud came at night when everybody was sleeping," he said. "They could not run to safety."

Twelve people were found dead and another was missing in Quang Ninh and Phu Tho provinces, as rampaging waters knocked down trees and electricity pylons and washed away houses, officials said.

62 dead in Vietnam floods

[Shammu]

Floods spur evacuation of thousands in SW China
Sun Aug 10, 2008 2:04pm EDT

BEIJING (Reuters) - Heavy rains and flooding have forced the evacuation of thousands in China's southwestern province of Yunnan, but no casualties have been reported, the official Xinhua News Agency said.

In the worst-hit city of Jinghong, more than 5,500 people had been affected by flooding caused by downpours since Friday afternoon, the news agency reported, without elaborating.

Disaster relief work was now underway, it added.

Flooding is a perennial problem for much of southern and eastern China in the summer. Floods have killed nearly 200 people across the country this year.

Officials in Vietnam, which borders Yunnan, said on Sunday that landslides and flash floods brought on by tropical storm Kammuri had killed about 80 people in the country's north.

Floods spur evacuation of thousands in SW China

[Shammu]

Dam breaks near Grand Canyon; hundreds evacuate

By AMANDA LEE MYERS, Associated Press Writer Sun Aug 17, 7:27 PM ET

PHOENIX - An earthen dam broke near the Grand Canyon early Sunday after heavy rains that forced officials to pluck hundreds of residents and campers from the gorge by helicopter. No injuries were immediately reported.

The failure of the Redlands Dam caused some flooding in the village of Supai, where about 400 members of the Havasupai tribe live, said Grand Canyon National Park spokeswoman Maureen Oltrogge.

As much as 8 inches of rain since Friday caused trouble even before the dam burst. A private boating party of 16 people was stranded on a ledge at the confluence of Havasu Creek and the Colorado River on Saturday night after flood waters carried their rafts away, Oltrogge said.

The boaters were found uninjured and were being rescued from the canyon, whose floor is unreachable in many places except by helicopter.

Rescuers were trying to find visitors staying at the Supai Campground and escort them to safety, Oltrogge said.

Evacuees were being flown to a parking area 8 miles from Supai and bused to a Red Cross shelter in Peach Springs, about 60 miles southwest of Supai, the spokeswoman said.

A flash flood warning was in effect for the area until the early evening. The area got 3 to 6 inches of ran Friday and Saturday and got about 2 more on Sunday, said Daryl Onton, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Flagstaff.

"That's all it took — just a few days of very heavy thunderstorms," he said.

Supai is on Havasu and Cataract creeks about 30 miles northwest of Grand Canyon Village, a popular tourist area on the south rim. Havasu Creek feeds the Colorado, which runs the length of the canyon.

The flooding came on a weekend during the busy summer tourist season, when thousands of visitors a day flock to the canyon for spectacular views, hikes or to raft its whitewater.

The helicopters lifting residents out were from the National Park Service, the National Guard and the Arizona Department of Public Safety, Oltrogge said.

In 2001, flooding near Supai swept a 2-year-old boy and his parents to their deaths while they were hiking.

The Grand Canyon has been the traditional home of the Havasupai for centuries.

Dam breaks near Grand Canyon; hundreds evacuate

[Shammu]

Keys take Tropical Storm Fay in stride

By BRIAN SKOLOFF, Associated Press Writer 1 hour, 18 minutes ago

KEY WEST, Fla. - Two years since a hurricane last lashed at Florida, many residents took a wait-and-see attitude Monday as a strengthening Tropical Storm Fay swept across the Florida Keys and bore down on the Gulf Coast.

While tourists caught the last flight out of town and headed out of the storm's path, residents in the carefree Florida Keys put up hurricane shutters and checked their generators, but not doing much more.

"We're not worried about it. We've seen this movie before," said 58-year-old Willie Dykes, who lives on a sailboat in Key West and was buying food, water and whiskey.

By early evening, locals and some tourists returned to the streets of Key West after the worst of the storm system passed the lower Keys, leaving the islands drenched but largely unscathed.

The sixth named storm in the Atlantic hurricane season was expected to be at or near hurricane strength before curling up the state's western coast and hitting Florida's mainland sometime Tuesday.

"There are bad storms and there are nice ones, and this is a nice one," said Becky Weldon, a 43-year-old guest house manager in Key West. "It cleans out all the trees, it gives people a little work to do and it gets the tourists out of here for a few days."

Officials were worried that complacency could cost lives, repeatedly urging people across the state to take Fay seriously. The message got through to tourists — Monroe County Mayor Mario Di Gennaro estimated 25,000 fled the Keys. Some residents have taken steps since the busy 2004-05 storm years, when eight hurricanes hammered Florida, such as buying generators and strengthening homes, but not everyone is as prepared.

"This is not the type of storm that's going to rip off a lot of roofs or cause the type of damage we normally see in a large hurricane," said Craig Fugate, the state's emergency management chief.

However, Fugate said: "I've seen as many people die when I have a blob-shaped asymmetrical storm that they dismiss as not being very dangerous."

The state took every step to make sure it was ready. National Guard troops were at the ready and more were waiting in reserve, and 20 truckloads of tarps, 200 truckloads of water and 52 truckloads of food were ready to be distributed.

One who did heed the call to prepare was Chris Fleeman, a 35-year-old mechanic on Big Pine Key who was busy helping friends and family members seal up their homes.

"I've got a generator and I've got a concrete home that I built myself, so I know it can withstand this," Fleeman said.

Since 2006, Florida has taken several steps to make sure its residents are prepared. More than 400,000 houses were inspected under a program that provides grants to people to strengthen their houses.

Florida law also now requires some 970 gas stations along hurricane evacuation routes statewide to have backup generators so they can keep pumping gas if the power goes out. Many utilities also have installed stronger power poles.

"Every hurricane that we have, we have additional lessons learned and experience," said U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla.

As it moved though the Carribean, Fay was blamed for at least 14 deaths in Haiti and the Dominican Republic, including two babies who were found in a river after a bus crash.

The storm center passed over Key West around 5 p.m. on Monday, and a hurricane warning was in effect along southwestern Florida from Flamingo to just south of the Tampa Bay area. A tropical storm warning in effect in the east from Flagler Beach southward.

At 8 p.m. EDT, Fay was about 105 miles south of Naples and moving north at about 9 mph. Sustained winds were about 60 mph with some higher gusts.

National Hurricane Center officials said the storm would likely make landfall sometime Tuesday morning. Forecasters said Fay would probably be at or near hurricane strength, which is winds of at least 74 mph.

No damage or injuries were immediately reported in the Keys, where a few bars and restaurants stubbornly remained open. Authorities said a possible tornado knocked down a tree on Big Coppitt Key and there were scattered power outages as well as local street flooding.

Local officials planned to reopen Key West's airport Wednesday.

Between 4 and 10 inches of rain is possible across mainland Florida, so flooding is a threat even far from where the center comes ashore, said Stacy Stewart, a senior hurricane specialist at the National Hurricane Center.

"This is a broad, really diffuse storm. All the Florida Keys and all the Florida peninsula are going to feel the effects of this storm, no matter where the center makes landfall," he said. "We don't want people to downplay this."

Farther north, residents were not so sanguine. In Punta Gorda — a Gulf Coast community hit hard by Hurricane Charley in 2004 — the sounds of drills were in the air as business owners attached aluminum storm shutters to windows and doors Monday afternoon.

The very idea of an August storm frightens residents there, especially those who rode out the compact but powerful Category 4 hurricane four years ago.

"I am scared," said Monica Palanza, a Punta Gorda real estate agent who remembers seeing trees topple on her neighbors' homes in 2004. "You can never be prepared enough."

Keys take Tropical Storm Fay in stride

[Shammu]

Quickly spreading brush fire burns homes in Reno

By SCOTT SONNER, Associated Press Writer 1 hour, 39 minutes ago

RENO, Nev. - A wind-whipped fire quickly crackled through sagebrush and grass on a residential hillside Monday in northern Reno before destroying several homes and forcing evacuations. No serious injuries were reported.

The cause wasn't known, but investigators were looking into reports that juveniles ran from the area about the time the blaze broke out.

Six homes are a total loss, and a seventh was seriously damaged, fire spokesman Steve Frady said. Responders included more than 50 firefighters and a helicopter.

"They jumped on it really fast. Sometimes conditions just combine to make it difficult to catch," he said. The most serious danger had passed by early evening, he said.

The fire sent up a plume of black smoke visible from downtown Reno, about 5 miles away.

Two firefighters were treated at the scene for exhaustion, and a third was taken to a Reno hospital as a precaution after inhaling smoke, Frady said.

The fire is in the same neighborhood where a blaze destroyed four homes and damaged a fifth in 2004. That fire was started by a pair of boys playing with fireworks.

In a central Oregon forest, a blaze threatened a small town after three fires touched off this month by lightning merged into one blaze, though no one has been evacuated.

High winds and temperatures over the weekend fanned the flames into a fury near the town of Mitchell, said Jeree Mills, spokeswoman for the fire dispatchers at the Northwest Interagency Coordination Center.

"The unstable air hit, and it blew up on 'em," she said.

The blaze was 2 miles south of the town, which has fewer than 200 residents, and threatened one home, fire officials said.

Quickly spreading brush fire burns homes in Reno

[Shammu]

South Asia monsoon rains kill 147 as thousands rescued
Mon Aug 18, 2008 9:39am EDT

By Sharat Pradhan

LUCKNOW, India (Reuters) - Heavy monsoon rains have triggered floods across South Asia in which 147 people have been killed in the past week as the downpours swamped villages and caused landslides, officials said on Monday.

Most of the deaths were due to house collapses triggered by incessant rains in India and Bangladesh. Thousands more have been evacuated across the region after their homes were flooded.

In the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, hundreds of old buildings collapsed, killing 73 people in the past two days, officials said.

"The victims were all very poor people, living in old and dilapidated buildings," said senior government official Balwinder Kumar. "So far we have received reports about the partial or full collapse of as many as 890 houses."

More rain was forecast in the next 48 hours and authorities fear the crisis could worsen.

More than 60 people were killed in flooding in India's southern state of Andhra Pradesh, with tens of thousands more moved to safety in makeshift camps.

In neighboring Bangladesh, at least 14 people were killed, a dozen injured and 10 others feared trapped under the rubble of collapsed houses in landslides in the port city of Chittagong and the coastal town of Cox's Bazar on Monday, officials said.

Every year monsoon rains leave a trail of death and destruction across South Asia, but much of the economy in a largely agricultural region depends on the downpours.

In the Himalayan nation of Nepal, thousands of villagers were moved to safety on Monday after a river in the southeast breached a dam and inundated huge swathes of crop land, police said.

More than 4,000 people from three villages had already been moved to safety in Nepal's Sunsari district after the Koshi river broke an embankment, police official Yadav Khanal said.

"The situation is getting worse and dangerous," Khanal said.

"No one has been killed so far but flood waters have submerged parts of a highway."

Sunsari lies in Nepal's southern plains about 200 km (125 miles) southeast of Kathmandu.

South Asia monsoon rains kill 147 as thousands rescued

[Shammu]

Floods force thousands to flee homes in India, Nepal
Wed Aug 20, 2008 4:26am EDT

GUWAHATI, India (Reuters) - Floods triggered by heavy monsoon rains left some 50,000 people homeless in India's remote northeast, officials said on Wednesday, warning of more rains in one of the country's most flood-prone regions.

Floodwaters swamped some 100 villages in Assam state, destroying homes and croplands and forcing thousands of people to the safety of high grounds.

Officials set up temporary shelters for the homeless in school and government buildings, and used wooden boats to rescue those marooned. Many camped on highways under plastic sheets with what little they had salvaged of their belongings.

"Water levels of all rivers are rising and hundred villages have been completely submerged," said P. C. Deka, an official at the worst-hit Majuli, a riverine island in Assam's Jorhat district. "Around 50,000 people are badly affected so far."

The regional weather office warned of more showers in the next 24 hours in the region.

In neighboring Nepal, at least 20,000 people were displaced and sheltered in relief camps in the country's southeast after a river broke a dam and flooded six villages, an official said on Wednesday.

Local media reports said three people were killed but an official said he had no information about the deaths.

Television channels showed video clips of people wading waist-deep water to higher ground, carrying babies in their arms and balancing their belongings on their heads.

Nepal's new Maoist Prime Minister Prachanda is scheduled to tour the affected areas on Wednesday, official said. He has already announced $300,000 as immediate relief to the flood victims.

Floods and landslides are common in mountainous Nepal during the annual monsoon season that normally begins in June and continues through September. About 50 people have died since the rains started this year.

In India, more than 200 people have been killed in rains in the past month, some 30 of them in Assam and the northeast. Most of deaths were due to houses collapsing or by drowning. Some people were killed in landslide.

Assam accounts for about 55 percent of India's tea production and also produces oil. Officials said the rains had not affected tea trade or oil exploration.

The monsoon usually hits India on June 1 and retreats in September, and is key to irrigating some 60 percent of farm land. But it leaves in its wake massive destruction, killing hundreds of people, destroying homes, crops, roads and bridges every year.

Floods force thousands to flee homes in India, Nepal

[Shammu]

Tropical Storm Fay Makes Fourth Florida Landfall; Death Toll Rises to 10

Saturday , August 23, 2008

STEINHATCHEE, Fla. —
Tropical Storm Fay crossed into the Florida Panhandle on Saturday, becoming the first storm of its kind in recorded history to hit the state four different times.

Fay's center made landfall around 1 a.m. EDT about 15 miles north-northeast of Apalachicola, Fla., according to the National Weather Service's National Hurricane Center.

Fay was expected to skirt across the Panhandle's coast Saturday and the coast of Mississippi and Alabama on Sunday, forecasters said.

Though Fay never materialized into a hurricane, its zigzagging downpours have been punishing and deadly.

Florida authorities said 2 more people were killed by Tropical Storm Fay Saturday, raising death toll to 10. The state attributed an additional death, before the storm hit, to hurricane preparedness after a man testing generators died of carbon monoxide poisoning.

"The damage from Fay is a reminder that a tropical storm does not have to reach a hurricane level to be dangerous and cause significant damage," said Florida Gov. Charlie Crist, who toured flooded communities this week.

Crist on Friday asked the White House to elevate the disaster declaration President Bush issued to a major disaster declaration. Crist said the storm damaged 1,572 homes in Brevard County alone, dropping 25 inches of rain in Melbourne.

Counties in the Panhandle — including Bay, Escambia and Walton — opened their emergency operations centers Friday in preparation for the storm's expected arrival there. To Florida's relief, forecasters expect Fay to weaken over the weekend and finally blow away before losing steam in Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana.

In Steinhatchee, just south of Florida's Big Bend, bartender Dana Watson said she was bracing for a possible drenching. "It's moving real slow. We're waiting. We're just waiting."

In an area that can flood badly when high tide rolls in during a bad storm, she said most people remain prepared. "We've all got our generators filled up with gas and oil and our nonperishable food," Watson said.

At 5 a.m. Saturday, the center of the storm was located about 20 miles southeast of Panama City and moving west near 7 mph with sustained winds near 45 mph. The storm was expected to keep its strength and remain a tropical storm into Sunday.

Meanwhile, heavy rain in Fay's wake were causing widespread flooding across the Jacksonville area, near the storm's third landfall. Forecasters said some areas of Duval County had received up to 20 inches, and authorities reported an unknown number of homes and businesses flooded.

Farther south in Florida, some of the hardest-hit areas got encouraging signs as the floods receded. Days earlier, 4 feet of water made roads look like rivers in Melbourne.

"This is a welcome sight," said Ron Salvatore, 69, who stood in his driveway Friday morning boiling coffee on a propane grill and surveyed a dry street. Salvatore and his wife Terry, 59, had been stuck in the house since Tuesday because water surrounded their home.

Florida Insurance Commissioner Kevin McCarty said so far nearly 4,000 flood claims from Fay had been filed.

Fay has been an unusual storm, even by Florida standards. It set sights on the state last Sunday and first made landfall in the Florida Keys on Monday. The storm then headed out over open water again before hitting a second time near Naples on the southwest coast. It limped across the state, popped back out into the Atlantic Ocean and struck again near Flagler Beach on the central coast. It was the first storm in almost 50 years to make three landfalls in the state, as most hit and exit within a day or two.

Tropical Storm Fay Makes Fourth Florida Landfall; Death Toll Rises to 10
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This is a email I got from my uncle in Jacksonville Fla. yesterday.

Hi Family & All,
 
And the rains came, and the wind blew and more rain and more wind. Flooding in streets and trees down, power out and stupid people swimming in the ocean. During the past 96 hours we have seen it all. Fortunately we have had power all during that time with one exception. Last evening power was off for about 1 minute. There are thousands without power this morning and it will be awhile before they get it on. One girl died while swimming in the ocean last evening. Did not go over to see Betty last evening as Wells Road is flooded and will probably not go this morning as it is still flooded. *********************** (I removed all personal information DW)
 
That is the latest from Orange Park.
 
Love and God Bless All,