Latest news with #Reni
Time of India
22-06-2025
- Science
- Time of India
Himalayas face growing rock-ice avalanche risk as temperatures rise: Experts
Dehradun: The recent rock-ice collapse on Switzerland's Birch Glacier, which buried 90% of the alpine village of Blatten under nine million cubic metres of ice, rock and debris, has reignited global concern over glacial instability amid rising temperatures. While a timely evacuation prevented casualties, the incident highlighted the growing threat of rock-ice avalanches (RIAs) – sudden, massive slope failures triggered by thawing permafrost and heavy debris accumulation. A recent study published in a peer-reviewed scientific journal 'Landslides' (Springer) has raised alarm about the increasing frequency and intensity of such events across High Mountain Asia (HMA), which includes the Himalayas, Karakoram and Tibetan Plateau. An analysis of 60 large-scale RIAs revealed that these disasters claimed at least 1,366 lives and inflicted extensive damage to ecosystems, water resources, infrastructure and local communities. Notable examples include the 2015 Langtang avalanche in Nepal, which killed roughly 350 people, and the 2021 Reni disaster in Chamoli, Uttarakhand, which left over 200 dead and destroyed two hydropower projects. A rock-ice avalanche is the rapid downslope flow of a mixture of rock and ice, often initiated by the collapse of a rock mass on or near a glacier. These events are particularly hazardous in glaciated mountain regions due to their high speeds, long runouts, and potential to evolve into devastating debris flows. The study found that 86% of these avalanches originated from steep, high-altitude slopes — mostly north or northeast-facing — and were primarily triggered by a combination of permafrost thaw, seismic activity and unstable bedrock. Nearly half of the events triggered cascading disasters, increasing their destructive potential tenfold and allowing runouts of up to 30 km. Experts warn that similar conditions are emerging across the Himalayas, where accelerating glacier thinning, warming permafrost, intense monsoonal rains and tectonic activity are converging to create a high-risk environment. "Global warming and temperature variability are altering glacial mass balance and thawing permafrost, heightening the risk of extreme events like rock-ice avalanches," said Dr Farooq Azam, a cryosphere expert at the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD) in Nepal. Geologist and former executive director of the Uttarakhand State Disaster Management Authority, Piyoosh Rautela, explained that cascading events are more likely when avalanches start from small, steep glaciers and feed into high-discharge river systems. "Medium-sized avalanches are particularly dangerous due to their ideal mix of debris volume and mobility," he said. Pierre Yves, senior advisor on Disaster Risk Reduction and Climate Change Adaptation at the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation, warned that continued warming, especially in permafrost zones, makes high-altitude Himalayan slopes increasingly prone to collapse. "Urgent hazard mapping and early warning systems are essential, especially in valleys with habitations and critical infrastructure," he said.
New Indian Express
12-05-2025
- General
- New Indian Express
Nepali SSLC student shines with full A+, including for Malayalam
KOCHI: The headmaster and teachers of Irumpanam Vocational Higher Secondary School (VHSS) are ecstatic. Sidhath Cheetri, who hails from Nepal and is the lone foreign student at his school, secured an impressive A+ in all six of his subjects – one of them Malayalam – in the SSLC examination held earlier this year. 'Sidhath is a very good student and had even joined the Roshini project to improve his Malayalam. His efforts paid off,' said headmaster Reni V K. 'Roshni' is the Ernakulam district administration's project aimed at improving language proficiency of migrant workers' children. Reni said Sidhath's brother had been their student and scored A+ in all subjects in SSLC. 'Sidhath joined us in Class 8. He studied from Class I to 7 in a school at Kodamkulangara. He has been consistent in his studies and plans to take up the science stream for Plus-I,' Reni said. Sidhath and his family have been living in Kerala for more than 14 years. His father is an attendant at Varma Hospital in Tripunithura and his mother works in a supermarket. He is one of the 95 Nepali students studying in Kerala schools. As per the statistics released by General Education Minister V Sivankutty in the assembly, 24,061 students from other states and 350 from other countries are enrolled in Class 1 to 12 in Kerala schools (2024-25). Ernakulam has the highest number of such students. Of those from other countries, a majority hail from Nepal (364), followed by the Maldives (two) and Sri Lanka and the Philippines (one each).
