Thousands killed in Burma(update NEW Cyclone on the way!)

UPDATE: Thousands killed


100's of people have been killed last night in a Cyclone that struck Burma,
The tropical cyclone called Nargis tore through country killing around 240 people so far, This is going to rise to terrible levels i feel i think this will go in to the 1000's

They have had to declare several areas disaster zones with officials saying it looks like a war zone,

Link

A tropical cyclone has killed at least 243 people in Burma and damaged thousands of buildings, according to state television.

Parts of the Irrawaddy region were hit particularly badly, with three out of four buildings blown down in one district.

Burma has declared Irrawaddy and four other regions, including the main city Rangoon, to be disaster areas.

Rangoon has been without power and water, its streets full of debris.

Winds of about 190km/h (120mph) battered the Irrawaddy, Rangoon, Bago, Karen and Mon regions.

source

Also there is some Video of the winds,
link



[edit on 5-5-2008 by asala]

[edit on 6-5-2008 by asala]

[edit on 6-5-2008 by asala]

[edit on 6-5-2008 by asala]

[edit on 14-5-2008 by asala]

Sadly the death toll is rising, Its over 300 deaths now

Several hundren people have been left with out home's


People there ae using candles and report that its a rubble site,

YANGON, Myanmar (AP) — Residents of Myanmar's largest city were plunged into a primitive existence Monday, using candles instead of electricity, lining up to buy shrinking supplies of water and hacking their way through streets blocked by trees felled in a cyclone that killed more than 350.

Older citizens said they had never seen Yangon, a city of some 6.5 million, so devastated in their lifetimes.

I wonder alsol how this will effect the politics in the country? Aid agencys are trying to get the goverment to allow them to move freely around the country but seem to be having problems,


I hope they get the aid they need as this really sounds terrible,

ap.google.com...



[edit on 5-5-2008 by asala]

Wow, well there are new reports coming in that there is 4000 dead! And 3000 people missing


This is a terrible event,

They need to act fast and international aid is being looked in to,

The most affected areas are the places that make the rice ect, so this could be terrible for the rest of the areas,

The Red Cross are working with the gov to bring in water,


[edit on 5-5-2008 by asala]

This is terrible. The last thing these people need is a natural disaster to pile on top of their ongoing turmoil.

[from www.nasa.gov...]

Tropical Cyclone Mala slammed Myanmar's Ayeyarwaddy delta, the west coast and the outskirts of the capital city of Yangon Friday and Saturday, April 29 and 30, 2006. Mala packed 150 mph sustained winds, which is a strong Category 4 hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson scale. This image was acquired by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer on the Terra satellite on April 28, 2006, at 10:05 a.m. local time (04:05 UTC). At the time of this image, the storm had sustained winds of 130 mph winds. Mala, which means "a garland of flowers" in Bengali is reported to have killed four, injured more than 30 people, destroyed hundreds of houses, five factories and two beach resorts. Credit: NASA/GSFC/MODIS Rapid Response Team

I think the article is old news, sorry - but the info is out there at least.

There's an image of the cyclone from space here.

I'm amazed they weren't better prepared for this judging by the size of the cyclone.

They said a little while back on the news that the world attention was on the Burmese government to see how they would react to the situation.

Judging by their recent record on human rights, i'd imagine that if they performed poorly here there might be some serious consequences for them.

*shakes head*

It's important not to turn this into something it isn't, i'm just glad it's getting the attention it is from the media.

The government had several days notice this storm was coming. Position reports of this storm were broadcast every 6 hours, for at least the prior 48 hours, to maritime interests throughout the Pacific and Indian ocean regions on high frequency radio.

Response will be interesting given past tendencies to restrict people and travel.

As an American, I will be interested in seeing if their response is better than Katrina's was. This is a hard statement for me to make, but it is the truth.

Well the Goverment there are now saying there could be up to 10.000 deaths

I must say living in a Cyclone hot spot in the North West of Australia is not a fun thing I spent 18 years in the north and have been in a few big cyclones

My last cyclone was 2007 that hit Port hedland a Cat 4 Wind speeds of 200+ KM

All of the houses in the north west are Cyclone rated Unlike the people in Burma who would not have had such luck

The CYclone George that hit our town took many trees and alot of sheds but we were lucky The roof on our house took a beating Another hour and we would have lost the roof and house

Once again a feel for the people who had to ride out the cyclone of Burma

Best wishes to all the people

UPDATE:


Well the death toll seems to be getting bigger by bigger by the hours

Now there saying 15.000 possible in just 1 area, and now 30.000 people are missing,

Aid still is not in there, The Aid workers are all waiting for the Government to give them a visa to allow them in,

The votes next weekend are still going on?????? How the heck can they do that when 50% of the voters are not even housed?

Shocking,

Also a piece that annoyed me was the point they knew this was coming for up to 3 days before and only warned the people who worked for the government So pretty much government areas of the country,

I'm trying to wrap my head around what kind of tempest could cause this human toll. A storm surge, a tsunami I can see. But a cyclone? I remember in gradeschool the pic of a piece of straw thru a telephone pole but this is just numbing.
Something isn't adding up here. Does not compute. A radicalized cyclone of formely unknown strength is at work here.

[edit on 5/6/2008 by jpm1602]

As far as warning goes, we all know how governments tend to think...

"Better to lose an unknown number of people in a catastrophy than to lose an unknown number of people in a panic."

Gotta love having very important and powerful people to "protect" you eh?

Nature has a way of reminding us humans just how insignificant we truely are...

This death toll is truely horrendous...hopefully overstated, though I doubt it.

As far as aid is concerned or rather the lack of it so far...

This is why, to the best of your ability, you must be ready to fend for yourself. Gov'ts don't care, never have, about the individuals affected, they care only about how it affects their power bases.

Against a catastrophe of this magnitude, all the preparedness in the world does little good, however. All you really can do, is get out of its way...and given the travel restrictions in Burma, the people couldn't even do that.

And to add more injury to the whole turmoil, I heard on Daily Planet last night that the rice harvest these people desperately rely on is all but gone.

Could effect a lot of people worldwide with the already increasing prices on such food staple.

The world just keeps getting smaller.

Originally posted by jpm1602
I'm trying to wrap my head around what kind of tempest could cause this human toll. A storm surge, a tsunami I can see.

Well cyclones most of the time proudce storm surge in coastal areas so its probable that it occured.

But a cyclone? I remember in gradeschool the pic of a piece of straw thru a telephone pole but this is just numbing.
Something isn't adding up here. Does not compute. A radicalized cyclone of formely unknown strength is at work here.

[edit on 5/6/2008 by jpm1602]

There is nothing unusual about a cyclone of this strength in this area and at this time of the year, when the water is extremely warm. The reason so many people died is due to the lack of awareness and the lack of adequate shelter in Burma, and also the fact that its a densely populated area. Its not the strength of the cyclone that killed so many people. yes, it was a category 4/5 but its no where near the strongest that has occured in this area

We watched this form and we tracked it at my work, it actually pulled all the moisture from our area into it, resulting in dry weather here

Extraordinarily there once again to add you extraordinary meteorlogical weather expetise. What would I do without you mate.

The State radio in Burma are now saying the death toll is up to 22.000 people,

Sadly i think its going to go up a heck of alot in the next few days,
If these people do not get the aid they need,

I worry that illness now will start spreading through,

Prime minister Gorden Brown is say he is ready to send Aid thats needed, But as most countries are saying... they wont deal with the militery as thy dont trust the food will get to the areas most needed,

Originally posted by jpm1602
Extraordinarily there once again to add you extraordinary meteorlogical weather expetise. What would I do without you mate.

Just stating the facts

Ive been through cyclones, but nothing like that strength. In Australia the north and north west coasts have laws put in place to ensure that buildings are reinforced enough to withstand the winds from cat 4 cyclones. Unfortunantly Burma has no such laws

Update,

Well According to the sources these deaths are only in 2 places so far, there is about 5 major places in all,

They say that it means there is hundreds of thousands of people who could have been killed, Or left with out shelter and injured,

Its hard to take in the scale of this terrible event,

My thoughts are with the people yet to be reached,

The Planes are still sitting at the Airport filled with Aid from India, , though some Visas have been given, there seems to be something up,


[edit on 6-5-2008 by asala]

And I wondered why the global consciousness eggs were red for so long Saturday.
I wonder no more.

reply to post by asala


Your worry will, unfortunately, be well founded in the coming days. Barring some sort of miracle, all sorts of wonderful little diseases will begin to rear their ugly little heads. Given half a chance, the death toll from these will rival the toll from the storm itself, add to that damage to food crops, rice in particular, and a govt. as repressive as this one, and you've the makings of a disaster of epic proportions...

With foriegn aid being delayed for whatever reason, the toll is going to be gruesome.