Global Weather News - 15 October 2005

[senorpepr]

NORTHEAST USA FLOODING
SPRING LAKE, N.J. - Toilets backed up with sewage, military trucks plowed through headlight-high water to rescue people, and swans glided down the streets as rain fell for an eighth straight day around the waterlogged Northeast on Friday.
Overflowing lakes and streams forced hundreds of people from their homes in New Jersey and New Hampshire, and parts of New York and Connecticut also were under flood warnings.
Some spots have had more than a foot of rain since Oct. 7, and 2 to 3 more inches of rain was expected in some places by Saturday.
Across the Northeast, at least 10 people have died because of the downpours since last weekend, and four others remain missing in New Hampshire.
Acting New Jersey Gov. Richard J. Codey declared a statewide state of emergency — the first step toward applying for federal aid — late Friday afternoon.
In the shore town of Spring Lake, giant military vehicles rolled in to help carry out hundreds of residents after an inlet flooded and a pumping station overflowed, sending sewage into the water.
Jack O’Connor, 84, was rescued from his apartment by rowboat. “All the years I’ve lived in Spring Lake, I’ve never been in a boat until now,” he said.
Not far away, 65 homes were evacuated because of lake flooding, and a dam at a state park failed, swamping the streets. About 100 nearby residents who evacuated overnight as the Shark River rose were being allowed to return by afternoon.
In the town of Oakland, a half-dozen swans glided down the middle of a street as neighbors watched water lap at their porches.
“It’s just lousy,” said Ralph Petricone. “Learn from your mistakes.”
In the northern part of the state, floodwaters knee-deep and higher cut off some neighborhoods, and sewage backed up into homes in Jersey City.
In Connecticut, the ground was so soft because of the steady rain that trees toppled, blocking the railroad tracks in Naugatuck. Commuters were forced to take shuttle buses.
Up to 3 inches of rain was expected in parts of southwestern New Hampshire. State workers passed out 46,000 sandbags and 550 well-testing kits.
Officials in Keene, N.H., one of the cities hardest hit by earlier flooding, issued a mandatory evacuation for 93 residents of a trailer home park along the Ashuelot River, and a voluntary evacuation for 1,200 other residents.
In Alstead, N.H., where at least 12 homes washed away last weekend, Gov. John Lynch set up a temporary office in the town fire department, passing out laminated cards with his cell phone number and direct lines to state agencies and public utilities.
[size=18]AMAZON RAINFOREST DROUGHT EMERGENCY[/size]
A worsening drought in the Amazon basin has prompted Brazil to extend an emergency across the Amazonas state.
Brazil's military has been distributing supplies and medicine to tens of thousands of people stranded by the dramatic drop in water levels.
Witnesses say rivers and lakes have dried up completely, leaving behind kilometers of sand and mud.
Environmental campaign group Greenpeace has blamed deforestation and global warming for the drought.
It quoted scientists as saying that the burning of forests has raised temperatures in the Amazon, preventing the formation of clouds.
Brazilian government meteorologists, however, have said the drought is the result of unusually high temperatures in the Atlantic Ocean, that have also been linked to this year's devastating hurricanes.
A state of emergency has been declared in all 61 municipalities of Brazil's Amazonas state as the drought has started affecting towns and cities further downstream, reports the BBC's Tom Gibb in Sao Paolo.
Brazil's armed forces have been delivering water, food and medical supplies to communities isolated by the worst drought in the Amazon for decades.
The air force has been distributing water-purifying chemicals to counter the threat of disease from water supplies contaminated by dead fish in the Amazon.
Low river levels are preventing boats - for many the only means of transport - from using the Amazon safely, leaving communities depending on government airlifts for their survival.
Big ships have been left stranded in the world's second-largest river and millions of fish are rotting in the sun, witnesses say.
Quake toll rises to 38,000; Rain, heavy cloud, lightning, and cold return to region, terminating relief flights due to weather and adding to the tremendous suffering
There has been a dramatic rise in the number of people Pakistan says were killed and injured in last Saturday's South Asia earthquake.
At the same time, bad weather has halted urgent air relief operations to some of those most in need.
Thunder and lightning rolled through the mountains around Muzaffarabad on Saturday morning and dark clouds hung low over the city like a shroud.
The 48-hour weather forecast for the region was for isolated thunderstorms followed by a cold snap that will bring nighttime temperatures to as low as three degrees Centigrade (37 degrees Fahrenheit).
The final death toll from last weekend's earthquake will not be known for a while yet, but Pakistan's Interior Minister, Aftab Sherpao, now says that 38,000 people are confirmed dead, almost double the original estimation.
The figure for the number of injured has also leapt to 62,000, while the Pakistani Government now believes that 3.5 million people have been rendered homeless.
Many of them are about to spend an eighth night unprotected from the cold and the rain, which has also bought heavy clouds and a halt to relief operations.
Mudslides have further obstructed already damaged roads into remote areas, now entirely reliant on airlifted supplies.
The overwhelming concern as relief operations moved from rescue to rehabilitation was the potentially deadly combination of bad weather and no real shelter.
In lieu of any organized camps, tent cities have sprung up in Muzaffarabad made up of a hodgepodge of plastic awnings, old signboards and a few real tents. The refugees burn wood from the rubble still wet from the rain, plastic bags and bottles or even donated clothing — whatever they can find to keep warm and cook.
Relief flights in and out of Muzaffarabad, the capital of Pakistani Kashmir, were severely disrupted on Saturday by rain. A few helicopters managed to take off from a makeshift landing pad in a sports field but it was nothing like what has become the routine of a flight every minute.
Some 3,000 Muslim faithful gathered in the country's largest mosque, Shah Faisal in Islamabad, for a special prayer session at the time of the quake just before 9 a.m. (0400 GMT) on October 8.
"Oh Allah give courage to those who survived this disaster to endure this hardship," the cleric prayed, his voice breaking with sobs as he called the Pakistanis who died in the quake martyrs. It is Ramadan in Pakistan, a holy month of prayer which also dictates fasting from dawn to dusk.
The 7.6 magnitude earthquake struck just outside Muzaffarabad, a city of 70,000 people 100 km (65 miles) northeast of Islamabad, at the foothills of the Himalayas, where the Indian and Eurasian tectonic plates meet.
A moderate aftershock rattled the Pakistani capital Islamabad in the early hours of Saturday, causing people to leave their homes for fear of collapsing buildings, witnesses said.
The magnitude 5.0 quake hit at around 0:36 local time. It was centered about 80 miles north of Islamabad in the heavy damage region of the original monster quake last weekend.
Residents of the capital have been nervous since an earthquake devastated areas of Pakistani Kashmir last weekend, leaving a wide trail of destruction and some 25,000 people dead and 2.5 million homeless.
Many buildings in the region that were not destroyed by the quake have been left in a perilous condition, leading to fears that aftershocks could bring teetering walls and roofs crashing down.
Some 400 aftershocks have rattled northern Pakistan since Saturday's quake, which was measured at 7.6 on the Richter scale.
Saudi Arabia has announced an emergency aid package worth almost $170 million for infrastructure projects in Pakistan.
The top relief coordinator for the United Nations (UN), Jan Egeland, says it will take up to a decade to rebuild the parts of Pakistan and neighboring regions hit by last weekend's earthquake.
The quake has left about 3.5 million homeless.
After visiting some of the badly affected areas, Mr Egeland says billions of dollars will be needed from the international community.
He has also emphasized the need for better cooperation between various aid organizations.
"My biggest worry today is that we will have tremendous bottlenecks," he said.
"We must now work very seemlessly together, Pakistani authorities and organizations and international organizations.
"If we don't work together we will become a disaster in the disaster because we will block each other."
Guatemala warns villagers of further mudslides
The Guatemalan Government is urging residents to leave nearly 20 villages amid fears of further mudslides.
The villagers at risk include Panjab in the Mayan highlands, where a huge mudslide caused by a tropical storm last week left hundreds of people dead.
Hundreds of bodies still lie beneath the soil, and although the official recovery operation has been called off, many feel the need to recover their loved ones.
Dr Gil Mobley from the Emergency Medical Team says the villagers now face the new threat of disease.
"We are a week away now from the travesty, this is a tinder box waiting to go up," he said.
"We need information from the world authorities on how to prevent a terrible epidemic of diarrhea diseases."