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Mint
06-08-2025
- Climate
- Mint
Uttarkashi Cloudburst: Extreme weather or reckless construction? What's wreaking havoc in the Himalayas, experts decode
Uttarkashi Cloudburst: At least four persons were killed and dozens feared washed away in the Uttarkashi district of Uttarakhand after purported flash floods triggered by torrential rain hit the Kheer Ganga river on Tuesday afternoon. Videos that went viral on social media showed giant waves of water gushing through the area and swallowing everything in their way, including the hotels and residential buildings in Dharali town, 8,600 feet above sea level. Heavy rain continued to pound Uttarkashi as rescuers resumed their operations on Wednesday in Dharali, searching for victims amid the rubble. Scientists say India's Himalayan states have been bearing the brunt of rising extreme weather events since the beginning of the Southwest Monsoon 2025, with a suspected cloudburst in Uttarakhand being the most recent one. On the afternoon of 5 August, a giant stream of water came down, gushing through the streets of Dharali village. While early visuals of the incidents indicated a possible cloudburst that triggered the flash floods, investigations are underway to ascertain the exact reason behind the catastrophic event. Experts said that the changing snowfall and rainfall patterns due to climate change have made the Himalayas vulnerable. Glacier retreat and permafrost thaw have decreased the stability of mountain slopes and the integrity of infrastructure, they said, citing a special report on the cryosphere by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). There is no doubt in blaming the rise in temperatures and humidity in the region for triggering back-to-back extreme weather events. 'With the axis of the monsoon trough running through the foothills of the Himalayas, we had already predicted a red alert for Uttarakhand. While the affected region is prone to cloudbursts, such a turn of events is due to the climate change-led rise in temperatures,' said Mahesh Palawat, Vice President- Meteorology and Climate Change, Skymet Weather. Early warning predicted intense rainfall, bringing a greater risk of landslides in high-elevation regions, demanding the development of specific mitigation and adaptation plans at a faster pace. Due to climate change, hazards such as glacier retreat, permafrost degradation, and lake shrinkage occur frequently in high-altitude regions, often leading to slope instability and an increase in the occurrence of deep-seated landslides, the scientists said. According to a research study, 'Increase in occurrence of large glacier‐related landslides in the high mountains of Asia', as many AS 127 landslides were detected in the Landsat images of the study area, covering the period from 1999 to 2018. The landslides are mainly concentrated in the Karakoram Mountains, the eastern part of the Pamir Mountains, the western Himalayas and south of the Hindu Kush. Further, the rampant development of infrastructure like hotels, tunnels, roads, and hydropower projects in the ecologically sensitive region has aggravated the situation and economic losses, the scientists said. 'The role of global warming is already established in the rise of extreme weather events. We did not learn anything from the past disasters in 2013 (Kedarnath) and 2021 (Rishiganga). Why have there been no checks on unplanned construction in the region?,' said Dr YP Sundriyal, Professor of Geology at HNB Garhwal University. Dr Sundriyal said that the Himalayas, the youngest mountain range in the world, are very fragile ecologically. 'This makes it a very sensitive region. Concerned authorities and local bodies should include scientists while carrying out any construction in the region, as they are well-versed in the geology. When such torrential rainfall occurs over hill slopes, it becomes more dangerous as debris flow leads to erosion due to landslides, making flash floods more powerful and disastrous,' he said. According to experts, the need of the hour is to recognise that the increase in such events in Uttarakhand is not exclusively due to the climate crisis. 'Increased development activity in vulnerable regions creates new risks to the mountain community,' Anil Kulkarni, distinguished visiting scientist, Divecha Centre for Climate Change, Indian Institute of Science, told Hindustan Times. Mallika Bhanot, environmentalist and member of Ganga Ahvaan, a civil society collective, says the river will take its route come what may. "It is only natural to expect that it will flow freely. Any hindrances to its flow will obviously cause disasters. The massive increase in the number of landslides is again completely linked to road construction on the Char Dham route,' Bhanot told Hindustan Times. The role of global warming is already established in the rise of extreme weather events. The Char Dham Highway Project in Uttarakhand is an ongoing initiative to improve road connectivity to the four sacred Hindu pilgrimage sites: Yamunotri, Gangotri, Kedarnath, and Badrinath. While the project is nearing completion with over 70% of the work done, some sections are still under construction. The project aims to provide all-weather access to these shrines and enhance travel safety and convenience for pilgrims.
Politico
08-07-2025
- Science
- Politico
Flood predictions could worsen when Trump's cuts take hold
That means predicting future floods — and the development of new tools for forecasting intense rainfall events — would be compromised. The next generation of Landsat satellites is a key example. For about 50 years, the satellites have been an essential tool for monitoring and mapping floods. Their data is important 'for assessing risk, mapping the extent of damage, and planning post-disaster recovery,' according to NASA. Trump is working to eliminate its funding. A few weeks ago, Trump administration officials archived the Landsat account on X and deleted information related to the planning for Landsat Next, the tenth version of the satellite, from its webpage. Weather forecasts gradually improve as scientists add more data. But they'll likely plateau — or even degrade — as NOAA's research and observation functions vanish, many scientists warn. OAR's research 'has been amazing at developing computer models to help in the forecasting of these types of events,' said John Sokich, NWS's former director of congressional affairs, referring to the Texas floods. But if the office isn't reinstated by Congress for 2026, he said, 'that's going to stop.' Some of the agency's most valuable models for flood prediction might be in jeopardy sooner rather than later. The government's accurate forecasts of the deadly floods were made possible by a suite of high-resolution NOAA weather models designed to predict thunderstorms, Daniel Swain, a climate scientist at UCLA, said in a live YouTube talk Monday. Having multiple models in the system helps scientists evaluate a range of possible outcomes when severe weather is on the horizon. NOAA tried to consolidate the collection of models into a single forecasting system a few years ago. But meteorologists expressed concern that it might not perform as well, and the change was delayed. Trump plans to revive the plan. 'There's benefit in having multiple models,' Swain said. 'How expensive is it really to maintain that, as opposed to the cost of them missing a catastrophic flood?' 'A disconnect' Meanwhile, staffing cuts at NWS offices across the country are likely to take a toll over time, experts say. NWS offices were adequately staffed during the Texas floods, in part because agency officials called 'all hands on deck' to deal with the disaster, according to Fahy. But the offices still have vacancies in key roles, including a permanent meteorologist-in-charge in San Angelo and a warning coordination meteorologist in San Antonio.
Indian Express
30-06-2025
- Politics
- Indian Express
For renewal of Western Ghats, put people at the centre
The National Mission for a Green India bases its estimates and proposals for action on the information provided by the Forest Survey of India (FSI), and its execution by the Forest Department (FD). Regrettably, FSI data is quite outdated, available on a crude scale and deliberately distorted. At the same time, the FD, an anti-science, anti-nature, anti-people agency, will never end up greening the Western Ghats. What we need instead is a different science-based, nature-centric and people-oriented approach. I came to understand the way the FD manages its affairs as a result of M Y Ghorpade, then Karnataka's finance minister, being gheraoed by basket weavers in 1975. The weavers were complaining about the excessive cutting of bamboo by the paper industry in the state, which was adversely affecting their livelihoods. Ghorpade decided that an objective evaluation was required and asked me to undertake the task. This took me to the West Coast Paper Mills (WCPM) at Dandeli, in the district of Uttara Kannada in Karnataka. My mandate was to investigate whether bamboo resources had indeed been depleted and assess afresh the resource position, based on the data available from the FD's 'Pre-Investment Survey of Forest Resources' (PISFR), WCPM, and our own fresh fieldwork. These field studies revealed the PISFR figures to be overestimates by a factor of 10. This inflated figure for bamboo had provided a justification for setting up one more paper mill. We were able to reassess the bamboo stocks in the field because detailed information, disaggregated to the level of forest compartments (a geographically defined and permanently demarcated unit of forest land, used for management, planning, and record-keeping purposes), was made available to us. This would not have been possible if we had access only to highly aggregated data such as at a district or division level, which is all that is available to the general public as official statistics. In 1972, Satish Dhawan became the chairman of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). In July that year, satellite imagery of Earth became available with the launch of the Landsat programme. Dhawan immediately set up the National Remote Sensing Centre (NRSC) in Hyderabad to undertake and facilitate remote-sensing activities in the country. One of the early projects of NRSC was to interpret the 1972–75 Landsat imagery to assess the forest cover of the country. The results of the NRSC study were startlingly at variance with FD's official information. While the FD claimed that 23 per cent of the country was under forest cover, remote-sensing imagery showed that the forest cover was much less, only about 15 per cent. The government forthwith ordered NRSC to stop its assessment and set up the FSI as the exclusive agency to do so. The FSI provides data at highly aggregated levels, such as at that of districts, and after a delay of two or three years. There is absolutely no justification for data continuing to be so delayed and aggregated in the day and age of Google Earth and other satellite data that are freely available to all members of the public in real time and at scales as fine as 10 hectares. There are other instances, too. Earlier, in 1963, the Grasim rayon factory began producing pulp and fibre in Mavoor, on the banks of the Chaliyar river in Kerala's Kozhikode district. The management neglected to adopt any pollution-control measures citing profitability concerns and recklessly released poisonous effluents into the river, adversely impacting its fish and clam population and human health. It turned out that the effluent had high levels of poisonous mercury, lead, nickel, cobalt, iron, chromium zinc and copper. The factory was supplied bamboo at a throwaway price of Re 1 per tonne when its market price was Rs 1,400 per tonne. It led to the destruction of 10,000 hectares of bamboo forests in Wayanad. As stocks of bamboo became depleted, Grasim came to depend on eucalyptus, and the government promoted eucalyptus and Australian acacia plantations, accompanied by large-scale use of pesticides in the forest areas. Together, it led to the destruction of natural resources and human suffering with the active knowledge and collusion of the FD. What, then, should we do? Pachgaon in Maharashtra's Chandrapur district shows the way. Pachgaon was assigned Community Forest Rights (CFR) under the Forest Rights Act of 2006 over 1,000 ha of land. It is exercising this right to good effect. Through bamboo sales, Pachgaon earns a good income. So its people have stopped setting fire to tendu leaves to stimulate fresh growth. This is despite the fact that tendu leaves, too, were a good source of income. Additionally, they have voluntarily set aside 30 hectares as a sacred grove. With this, the forest is registering healthy growth and sequestering large quantities of carbon. This has also meant security of livelihoods and greater self-respect for the people. Earlier, many villagers used to migrate all the way to Gujarat to earn a living. Now, very few people leave the village. This is clearly the way forward for effectively greening the Western Ghats. The entire region is crying out for an honest implementation of the Forest Rights Act and assignment of Community Forest Rights to a substantial proportion of the population that has been living inside forests or on their fringes for over three generations. At the same time, we should take forward the process of democratic decentralisation and involve people in the decision-making process. This is what the Western Ghats Ecology Expert panel advocated and I wish to reassert that this, indeed, is the way ahead. The writer is an ecologist
Yahoo
24-06-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Final photo from iconic US satellite shows how Las Vegas has 'doubled' in size over the last 25 years
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. QUICK FACTS Where is it? Las Vegas, Nevada [36.10457930, -115.1448612] What's in the photos? Aerial shots taken at the start and end of a satellite's operational lifespan Which satellite took the photos? Landsat 7 When were the photos taken? July 4, 1999 and May 28, 2024 The last image captured by the recently decommissioned Landsat 7 satellite shows the sprawling mass of Las Vegas flowering in the heart of the Mojave Desert. The final photo also mirrors one of the satellite's first-ever shots, highlighting how "Sin City" has rapidly expanded during the iconic spacecraft's 25-year lifespan. Landsat 7 is an Earth-observing satellite co-owned by NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) that orbits our planet roughly every 99 minutes. It was launched on April 15, 1999, and has since taken more than 3.3 million images of Earth's surface, covering almost every square inch of the globe. On June 4, the satellite received its final transmission from operators, marking the official end of its mission after a year-long decommissioning process that took the spacecraft out of the path of other satellites before it ran out of fuel. Landsat 7 will now drift in space for around 55 years before eventually reentering and burning up in the atmosphere, according to a USGS statement. The satellite's final image was captured on May 28, 2024. It shows the Las Vegas metropolitan area, including towns such as Henderson, Paradise and Spring Valley, sprawled across the Nevada desert. The final image was taken from the same distance and angle as one of the satellite's first shots of the city, taken on July 4, 1999. Comparing the two side-by-side shows how much the city has expanded — nearly doubling in size. Related: See all the best images of Earth from space Between 2000 and 2023, the population of the Las Vegas metropolitan area went from 1.38 million to 2.33 million, which is an increase of around 69%, according to USGS. In 2025, an estimated 2.4 million live in the area. Lake Mead, an artificial reservoir of the Colorado River created by the Hoover Dam, can also be seen in both satellite images. The lake is noticeably smaller in the latest image, possibly due to increased water consumption in the region it serves or the effects of human-caused climate change. However, the lake's size naturally fluctuates, both seasonally and annually, making it hard to tell how it is being impacted by anthropogenic factors, according to NASA's Earth Observatory. Landsat 7 is the seventh satellite in the Landsat program, which has been continuously capturing images of Earth's surface since 1972. It was a serious upgrade from previous iterations and was particularly good at photographing urban areas, which was its primary focus. The spacecraft played a major role in the development of mapping services, including Google Maps, and also captured unique perspectives of some iconic moments in recent history, including the 9/11 terror attacks, Hurricane Katrina, and the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. The satellite was only designed to operate for five years, but it has far exceeded this target, despite suffering a significant instrument failure in 2003, which was later fixed. NASA previously reconsidered refueling the satellite in orbit to extend its lifespan, but this first-of-its-kind maneuver was never attempted. MORE EARTH FROM SPACE —Quadruple volcanoes on secret Soviet military base linked to climate-altering eruption 200 years ago —A mysterious 'black hole' in Pacific Ocean that sparked wild rumors online —The mysterious hill in Sudan that looks like 'landlocked lips' There are now only two operational Landsat satellites circling our planet: Landsat 8, which has been in orbit for more than 12 years; and Landsat 9, which launched in September 2021. The 10th Landsat satellite, named Landsat Next, was supposed to be launched by 2031. However, its funding is now uncertain thanks to the drastic cuts to NASA's budget proposed by the Trump administration, and mission experts are now "assessing alternate mission architectures," according to the Landsat Next homepage.
Newsweek
10-06-2025
- Climate
- Newsweek
Deadly Tornado's Impact on Kentucky So Big It's Visible From Space
Based on facts, either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources. Newsweek AI is in beta. Translations may contain inaccuracies—please refer to the original content. The path of a recent tornado that tore across the state of Kentucky has been photographed from above, revealing the massive scar it left across the land. On May 16, a deadly tornado ravaged three counties in Kentucky, taking 20 lives, destroying hundreds of houses and leaving a trail of destruction in its wake just over 55 miles long and up to a mile wide. The image of the devastation was captured the Operational Land Imager-2 (OLI-2) instrument aboard NASA's Landsat 9 Earth-imaging satellite. The track of the twister was made particularly clear in the images as it passed through the Daniel Boone National Forest, where it ripped up trees in its path. The tornado's track, taking by the NASA Earth Observatory using Landsat data from the US Geological Survey. The tornado's track, taking by the NASA Earth Observatory using Landsat data from the US Geological Survey. Wanmei Liang/NASA Earth Observatory/ Landsat According to NASA and the National Weather Service (NWS), the tornado was one of the strongest ever recorded in the area, peaking at a four on the Enhanced Fujita (EF) Scale. This is the second-highest ranking on the scale, with three-second gusts between 166 to 200 miles per hour. In fact, the tornado in question was estimated to have reached speeds as high as 170 miles per hour. The Kentucky tornado was part of a severe weather outbreak over several days which hit multiple states, including Alabama, Kansas, Missouri and Virginia. At least 20 people were killed in Kentucky alone, with the office of Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear reporting that 17 people died in Laurel County, one in McCracken County, one in Pulaski County and one in Russell County. Read more Violent tornadoes leave at least 27 dead in multiple states: What to know Violent tornadoes leave at least 27 dead in multiple states: What to know "I promise that we will be there for our people until every home and every life is rebuilt. And I want to thank all our heroic first responders for the work they've done over the past few days," Beshear said in a statement. "This is another incredibly tough time for Kentucky. And it's another reminder that life is short and it's our duty to be kind and do good. As always—we will get through this together." A 2024 study on the National Land Cover Database (which is based on Landsat observations) has found that tornado damage to forests in the southeastern U.S. is on the rise, despite a slight decrease in tornado activity across the states as a whole. Do you have a tip on a science story that Newsweek should be covering? Do you have a question about tornados? Let us know via science@ Reference Munro, H. L., Loehle, C., Bullock, B. P., Johnson, D. M., Vogt, J. T., & Gandhi, K. J. K. (2024). Tornado damage in forest ecosystems of the United States. Agricultural and Forest Meteorology, 350.
