Water level at Kotri Barrage crosses 900,000 cusecs

Several villages in Hyderabad are inundated as Kotri Barrage braces for the worst flood in 50 years. The super flood passing through Kotri will take at least six days to subside.

The provincial government is monitoring the situation at dykes as the water pressure builds up. More than 900,000 cusecs of water is likely to pass through the barrage.

Irrigation experts said that the current flood torrent has broken the record of the 1976 floods.

Meanwhile flood water has entered parts of the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) building in Hyderabad. Water has already caused devastation in Ghauspur, Thul, Jacobabad, Garhi Khairu and other adjoining areas.

Water pressure at Right Bank Outfall Drain (RBOD) III has been reduced by making breaches at three points and efforts are underway to keep the safety dyke in ShahdadKot intact.

Flood torrents from Garhi Khairu and Balochistan have reached Hamal Lake. For the past ten days, transport of food items between Sindh and Balochistan are at a halt due to suspension of the road link between the two provinces.

By hook[ah] or crook

KARACHI: Frail Sadori Mai may have survived the loss of all her possessions when the flood hit her hometown but she could not overcome the loss of her hookah.

All the survivors gathered at Razzaqabad relief camp in Karachi have their own grievances but Sadori is unique in her sorrows. Her family lost all their earnings in the flood but the loss of Sadori’s hookah was too much to bear for the 60-year-old.

However, her wrinkled face broke into a smile when she got a new one. “I bought this for Rs200,” boasted Sadori, pointing to her newly acquired hookah. “I can survive without roti but I cannot live without hookah,” she claimed.

According to Sadori, she has been smoking hookah ever since she can remember and cannot imagine having to live without it. Even her family is immune to the gurgle of the hookah. “We lost everything in the floods but my mother told us in Jacobabad that if she did not get a hookah she would kill herself,” recalled her son Ahsan Ali.

Over the years, Sadori has seen many tough times and she is saddened by the floods that have made her homeless. But she is hopeful that these times will pass and she will be able to return home. It is this hope that allows Sadori Mai to sit back and relax with a puff or two as she hangs out outside her tent with her neighbours and old friends from Jacobabad.

Five children die of starvation in Kohistan

ABBOTABAD: At least five children died of starvation in a village in the flood-battered Kohistan district of Hazara division, a local lawmaker reportedly said on Sunday.

Speaking to journalists in Bisham, MPA Abdul Sattar Khan said that the mountainous Kohistan district of the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province has been cut off from the rest of the country since surging floodwaters destroyed vital infrastructure, including roads and bridges, in the area two weeks ago.

“‘We are facing a very serious food crisis in the district. Five children have already died and many more people would starve to death if they don’t get food in the next two days,” Khan was quoted by a local newspaper as telling journalists.

The lawmaker claimed that he somehow managed to reach Bisham to send out an SOS because the telecommunication system has collapsed in Kohistan. He came down hard on the government for “ignoring the people affected by  floods in the region”. He said that no government aid has reached upper Kohistan, which has been cut off from the rest of the country.

Khan called upon the government to immediately provide aid to hundreds of families stranded in upper Kohistan to avert a human catastrophe.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 16^th, 2010.

One more test for flood survivors

PESHAWAR: Hundreds of thousands of Pakistanis will be spending this Ramazan in relief camps instead of their homes that they had to abandon to survive the country’s worst floods in living memory.

According to the World Food Programme, an estimated four million people face food shortages and the United Nations says that six million Pakistanis need ‘survival’ aid. The international community has pledged tens of millions of dollars – but much more will be needed to set Pakistan back on track. Citizens have remained just as active in collecting funds and relief goods. In unaffected areas, Pakistanis have even started organising their own relief campaigns.

“There isn’t enough food and at the onset of Ramazan, we really want to make sure that the flood survivors have enough to eat. They have no homes and all the supply routes have been disrupted so the first priority is to make sure that food is available to them,” volunteer Shoaib Khalil told The Express Tribune.

Cyclone Phet enters Sindh

KARACHI: Cyclone Phet advanced into Sindh wreaking havoc in some areas, while skipping over Karachi.

The overall death toll since its entry into Pakistan stood at 8 on Sunday evening, with dozens injured. The cyclone was downgraded to a tropical depression but Sindh is expected to receive rain till Monday evening.

End of live coverage

8:00pm

The Meteorological Department has said the outer circle of the Phet cyclone has hit Thatta and Badin while the central circle of the storm will make landfall in two hours. See photos throughout the day here. It has been confirmed that Karachi will not bear the brunt of the storm.

Heavy rainfall suspends helicopter service in Hunza

GILGIT: The helicopter services have been suspended in Hunza after heavy rains in the area, while water outflow from Attabad Lake has reached 3,200 cusecs.

The rate of erosion has also increased and visible cracks have appeared around the spillway, indicating that it may breach at any time.

The slow flow of water through the spillway has caused the lake to expand in length and depth, allowing water to submerge more and more houses in villages upstream.

Water outflow from Attabad lake rises

Water outflow from the Attabad Lake into the spillway has reached 750 cusecs while erosion has reached up to seven meters.

With around 300 cusecs of water also being discharged through seepages, the total amount of water being discharged daily is more than 1,100 cusecs.

Land routes to Gulmat, Shishkat, Aian Abad, Hussaini, Zahir Abad and Khurram Abad have been flooded.

Major flood in Attabad less likely, say officials

GILGIT: Officials have downplayed the possibility of a major flood occurring in Attabad in the next three days, as outflow from the ‘landslide lake’ has increased steadily.

“There is no chance of a flood occurring in the next three days as the erosion of the spillway is slow,” said district administrator Hunza,  Zamir Abbas on Monday. “But that doesn’t mean that the lake will never breach its banks,” he said, adding, that the danger was still very real and officials were aware of all possibilities.

The slow discharge of lake water from the spillway has overturned expert’s predictions that the area would be flooded 24 hours after the water reached the spillway.

Water begins flowing from Attabad lake

KARIMABAD, Pakistan: Water began seeping out from a lake formed by a landslide in north Pakistan into a spillway on Saturday, officials said, who added that the next one or two days are critical to avoid catastrophic flooding.

If the spillway doesn’t contain the water and the landslide dam bursts, authorities fear the heavy flooding could wash away many villages, bridges and roads, affecting up to 50,000 people.

“At this point, the water flow is very smooth but it’s eroding the spillway, widening it,” Gilgit-Baltistan’s Commissioner, Asif Bilal Lodhi, told Reuters by telephone.

People asked to avoid Red Zone

The National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) has said that water discharge from the spillway of the “landslide lake” in the Attabad area of Hunza Valley is likely to begin anytime.

The lake was formed on January 4 when a massive landslide blocked the flow of the Hunza river at Attabad. The 20-kilomtre-long lake has submerged several upstream villages and destroyed a huge chunk of the strategic Karakoram Highway (KKH). And now it is threatening downstream villages.