After Typhoon Number 12

[mbarker]

I'm not sure how much of this made it to American news. This last weekend, Japan got clobbered. Typhoon number 12 rolled over most of Japan at a slow, deliberate pace, which meant we had heavy rains for extended periods of time. Today's news is full of video of towns and villages that have been flooded, overrun by mudslides, and so forth. Plenty of roads have had bridges destroyed, sections undercut and falling, or rock and mudslides. Add in trees that fell over and the other normal hazards of heavy weather, and it's a mess.

Very reminiscent of coverage from the earthquake and tsunami, actually.

There are shelters set up in various parts of the country, and the SDF is busily rescuing people. The report at noon was that nationwide we have 39 deaths and 55 lost or missing from the typhoon. That's high for a typhoon in Japan.

Some of this is also... Well, think about it. The earthquake and tsunami hit the coastal areas which are often at the end of rivers -- drainage basins. So when you get flooding in the typhoon, who gets hit again? Right. And in many cases, they haven't really had a chance to build up to handle extreme weather again.

Oh, there's one situation that I think is going to be difficult. I'm not sure where it was, but there was a major slide into a fairly narrow valley that built a little dam. The floodwaters backed up behind it and made a small lake. I'm sure the question for the emergency folks is do they try to stabilize that dirt and rock dam so that they can try to release the floodwaters slowly? Or should they just blow the little dam and accept a quick flood below? Tricky question.

I have to admit, I'm a little bit suspicious that some of the slides may be tied directly to the earthquake and aftershocks. After all, if you've been shaking the ground just a little bit for the last six months, and then add heavy rains? Any mountainside that was not completely stable has to be ripe for slides.

Oh, well. Today, here in the Kansai area, it's a beautiful fall day, lovely blue sky, a few fluffy white clouds slowly drifting. I think Hokkaido is still catching the last tail end, but mostly the rains have passed. Now it's time to dry off and dig out from under again.

Comments

[dialyn.livejournal.com]

I have to admit, I don't recall hearing anything about this. I think the U.S. was obsessed in the last week with a minor earthquake in the east followed by a hurricane that created quite a mess out of the Atlantic coastline. We tend to obsess about our own problems even though Japan is dealing with much more damaging ones. It doesn't seem as if the country is getting a chance to heal between events. Thank you for the update, as sad as it is.

[saruby.livejournal.com]

I agree with that analysis, unfortunately. The U.S. seems to be only sporadically interested in the fates of those in other countries. To be fair, Hurricane Irene was very serious and had the potential to be even worse than it was, since it ran right over New York City. I know that I did not hear anything about typhoons over the weekend.

Why do they number typhoons instead of naming them? Or do they do both?

[dialyn.livejournal.com]

I do apologize for making the hurricane seem less serious than it really was. I realize that people are still struggling with the aftermath and it killed over forty people. The media here tends to repeat one story over and over and over again, rather than covering news more broadly. I guess that's cheaper, but it does give us a rather narrow impression about what is going on.

[saruby.livejournal.com]

I didn't think you were diminishing Irene and I totally agree with you. In fact, I think it is one of the biggest problems with cable news: they beat every story into the ground, dig it up and beat it again. Also, they make stories seem much bigger than they are. Case in point the earthquake in VA, which caused limited damage and no serious injuries, but blanketed the news for two days.