Wednesday, June 26, 2013

Uttarakhand tragedy

Uttarakhand disaster is another example of how small and helpless we humans are, when nature strikes. Nature is just providing examples, in how many different ways it can demolish every thing around us in as minimum time as possible. Few years back, we for the first time understood the meaning of word Tsunami when it hit countries like Indonesia, Malaysia, Sri Lanka and some parts of India. The kind of devastation it brought made us realize how quickly nature can demolish every thing humans built over years of time. We witnessed a worse version when an Earthquake followed by Tsunami hit Japan killing over 10,000 people with in an hour. I thought, that's it. This is the worst form of demolition act nature has in its kitty. But, since last week, this view is again changing. The Himalayan Tsumani as it is called now, was something I never imagined even in my dreams. I had heard about cloud burst earlier. I guess I even experienced one. But I never imagined it can do this much destruction. Few days back, when I saw houses, temples and what not sinking in the flowing water, I realized, this is not as usual as I was thinking. I did not understand the reasons behind it properly, but apparently two different systems from two directions responsible for heavy rains combined together in Uttarkhand, resulting in never seen before destructive rains. 
Can you imagine a whole village wiped out in few minutes? What must have happened in Kedarnath. As per the interviews of survivors from Kedarnath, there was a big noise somewhere above around 7.00 p.m. and soon people started running seeing water coming down towards them. With in minutes every thing in Kedarnath was demolished. Even the temple survived the blow because of a big stone that settled just behind the temple and diverted the flow in two directions. I have never encountered such a devastation and surely  I don't want to.
There were huge land slides across  the route reaching these higher places and there was no way to provide help in short time. Only way to reach them was through air using choppers. I kept wondering why Indian government provided such a limited number of choppers to evacuate people and provide help to those in need. If you heard the news, only 60 choppers were employed for the task. Why? Do we have only 60 choppers in India? Even in Hollywood movies which is not a real thing, many a times they show these many helicopters used. No wonder it is taking so long for complete evacuation. But I appreciate the efforts of Indian Army  and other forces who in spite of limited resources and worst weather conditions have done hell of a job. Had it not been them, I feel the scene would have been worse. Though we always encounter disaster every now and then, we don't have any disaster management program in action. Apparently, there is a committee for it existing  since 2004 but they haven't come out with even a single program till date. Nobody has any clue how to tackle such demolition acts except the Army forces who are the only savior for any Indian in any corner of India. I believe these men should be shown better appreciation because of the act they put to keep us safe either from our enemies or from such natural disasters.
Finally I would like to share a video I came across released by IBN showing a sudden influx of water can brings everything down with it.

12 comments:

Indrani said...

This is one of the most tragic incident in recent times. Considering most of the tourists were senior citizens, I feel sad to think what they must have gone through.

Anonymous said...

We can't fight nature,we can just expect them to calm down...

Tomichan Matheikal said...

60 choppers. Good enough in India. Individuals in India can afford choppers for their private use. But for the common man? 60 is already a large number. That's India.

Easwar Arumugam said...

This all shows that 'Disaster Management' is not in place. Again, the rescue operations was delayed for the reasons better known to the authorities-concerned. We, Indians, always resort to 'fire fighting' rather than taking appropriate preventive actions.

drkaustubhjoshi said...

Yes. The worst part is it was not just an evacuation. All old people had to climb up mountains which even young ones would try to avoid.

drkaustubhjoshi said...

Yes, but we can surely learn ways to avoid human casualties.

drkaustubhjoshi said...

I am guessing, you have a sarcastic tone to this.

drkaustubhjoshi said...

Guess, we need few more years to understand the meaning of preventive measures

Anonymous said...

many valid points you have put across Doc !! only 60 choppers ??
may be the rest are required for the govt and opposition leaders to do areal surveys on public money

drkaustubhjoshi said...

I feel that a rule should be made that if a minister or some one like do a aerial survey. He should brought in public and asked lots and lots of questions and he should also give suggestions on to how the problem can sorted. Something Viva-voce.

கவியாழி said...

yes!its a tragedy. its become act of god?

Anonymous said...

It's a shame on humankind! More over it has shed some more light upon the awful political condition of our country as politicians fight over taking the credit of the 'help' they provided! Can anything be more worse? With our politicians...yes, it's possible!