The Stream, September 11, 2024: Super Typhoon Yagi, Asia’s Most Powerful Storm This Year, Drops Deadly Deluges on Vietnam

Basement apartments in New York City are vulnerable to flooding. Photo © J. Carl Ganter/Circle of Blue

YOUR GLOBAL RUNDOWN

Super Typhoon Yagi, the most powerful storm to hit Asia this year, has killed dozens of people in Vietnam, China, and the Philippines.
In northern Nigeria, after a dam overflowed amidst historic flooding, a zoo’s “deadly animals” were flushed into communities.
The recent killing of thousands of endangered mussels in Finland has sparked outcry and renewed scrutiny of logging techniques.
A new report from Global Witness finds that 196 environmental defenders were killed globally last year, with Columbia ranking as the deadliest country for activism.

New York City’s basement apartments, many of which are not up to code, are susceptible to deadly flooding.

“To be honest, I don’t like thinking about it … Even right now, I panic when I hear the word ‘rain.’ When they’re expecting rain in the night-time, me and my husband are awake.” — a homeowner in Queens whose elderly mother lives in their fixed-up basement.

When Hurricane Ida hit New York City in 2018, some basement apartments across the metropolis flooded at a rate of three inches per hour. But as climate scientists and activists are trying to communicate, the storm also served as a warning of what’s to come: 10 percent more rainfall in New York over the next decade, including 1.5 times more days with rain over one inch, according to the Guardian. And experts say many of the city’s 100,000 basement units — often the most affordable living arrangements on the market — are vulnerable.

With many units lacking full windows or burdened with low ceilings, flooding can quickly turn deadly. Around 4,000 of those units most susceptible to flooding hazards are being rented in low-income neighborhoods, highlighting a growing concern at the intersection of housing affordability and environmental justice. Pilot efforts to get these illegal units up to code have launched and failed as expenses have risen — converting 50,000 units would cost the city an estimated $14 billion.

— Christian Thorsberg, Interim Stream Editor

Recent WaterNews from Circle of Blue

Salt Water Again Moves Upstream in Weakened Mississippi River, Endangering Drinking Water — Army Corps builds a temporary barrier to block salt water encroaching on the nation’s largest river.
War, Drought Cause Spike in Violent Water Conflicts — New report catalogs sharp rise in clashes connected to water in 2023.

The Lead

Between eight and 17 inches of rain fell in just 24 hours in northern regions of Vietnam this weekend as Super Typhoon Yagi, the strongest storm to hit the continent this year, continued its movement across Asia.

Having since weakened to a tropical depression, precipitation has nonetheless been erratic and devastating. Areas of Hai Phong, a port city in the country’s northeast, sat 1.6 feet underwater on Sunday, Al Jazeera reports. Electricity remained out in multiple provinces. Roughly 40 miles up the coast, 30 vessels sank in the storms, while about 3,300 homes and nearly 300,000 acres of farmland were damaged in the strong winds and rains.

At higher elevations, Yagi has been deadly. A landslide was triggered in the Hoang Lien Son mountains, killing at least six people. As streams and rivers spilled onto streets and roads, vehicles — some with passengers — were swept away and submerged. A steel bridge over the Red River collapsed.

In Vietnam, at least 59 people have died in the typhoon, with many others injured or still missing. The scene was similar last week on Hainan, a Chinese island where more than 800,000 homes lost power and nearly half a million people were evacuated to higher ground. Roughly four people died in China, where Yagi’s wind speeds exceeded 150 miles per hour, while at least 20 people were killed when the storm swept through the Philippines.

Scientists say storms like Yagi are becoming more severe due to the warming of earth’s oceans, a phenomenon fueled by climate change and which offers more energy for higher wind speeds, greater precipitation, and erratic travel — the storms’ paths sweeping into new locations that haven’t historically been hit with such weather.

This Week’s Top Water Stories, Told In Numbers

Percent of the animals in Sanda Kyarimi Park zoo who have died in historic flooding not seen for decades in northern Nigeria. As for the survivors, floodwaters have washed “deadly animals… into communities,” where entire homes are underwater following a local dam’s overflowing, the Guardian reports. Following continued heavy rainfall, a post office and teaching hospital are among the other institutions affected in Borno state, in Nigeria’s northeast. Last month, 49 people were killed in floods in the region, while in 2022 more than 600 people died in record floods. Nigerian president Bola Tinubu has urged residents to evacuate.

The estimated number of environmental activists killed last year in Columbia, the deadliest country for such action, according to a new report from Global Witness. It was the highest annual count for a single country since the NGO began documenting cases in 2012. Globally, 196 activists were killed, some 43 percent of whom were Indigenous. With 25 murders, Brazil was the second deadliest country for environmental activism. COP16, a global biodiversity summit, will be hosted in Columbia in October.

On the Radar

After thousands of endangered river pearl mussels were crushed and killed in August by forestry machines transporting logs, the Finnish police are “investigating the incident as a case of serious environmental crime,” Reuters reports. Scientific divers found not only shell shards but sludge and dirt that prevented the mussels — who are essential for keeping fresh waters clean and healthy — from reaching oxygen-rich gravel. The Finnish Environment Minister Kai Mykkanen said he would be taking steps to ensure that the incident is the first and last of its kind.

In Context: Harnessing Mussels to Filter Fresh Water

More Water News

Chad Floods: Since July, extreme rainfall has brought “intense flooding” to every province in Chad, France24 reports. Per the United Nations, 341 people have died, 164,000 houses have been destroyed, and 640,000 acres of farmland have been ruined.

Yaqui River Valley: Communities in Mexico’s Yaqui River Valley are facing a triple-whammy of water crises amidst a widespread shortage, Mongabay reports. Mining and agribusiness has polluted freshwater sources with arsenic and heavy metals; saltwater intrusion continues to affect supplies near the coasts; and a lack of research has deepened a disconnect between what people are experiencing at the local level, and what government officials require as proof.

Christian Thorsberg

Christian Thorsberg is an environmental writer from Chicago. He is passionate about climate and cultural phenomena that often appear slow or invisible, and he examines these themes in his journalism, poetry, and fiction.