ONE more time the monsoon season finds us struggling to cope with widespread inundation, flooding and the attendant destruction of infrastructure and livelihoods. Although the scale of the devastation does not compare with what previous monsoon seasons have left behind, it is important to keep in mind that the rainy season has just begun. What is already apparent is the proliferation of threats that the climate presents. Previous monsoon seasons have seen large-scale flooding from overflowing rivers as well as breaches in the embankments. In 2010 there were serious fears that the barrages on the main stem of the Indus river could be swept away, something that thankfully did not happen. This year we add Glacial Lake Outburst Floods (Glof) to the list.

It is not clear yet how many Glof events occurred in Chitral, and what triggered them. Reports from the ground deny that Glof events created the floods, pointing instead towards rains as the trigger. They point out that the most heavily impacted region has no glaciers nearby. The Provincial Disaster Management Authority of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, in its situation reports, first reported that the floods were caused by Glof events, then later added torrential rains from a cloudburst to the causes too. In any case, what is clear is that the Met department failed to issue any kind of an alert. If the flooding was caused entirely by a series of large-scale, simultaneously occurring Glof events, then the Met department would be largely powerless to forecast. But if the rains served as a trigger for the Glof events, and the timing would suggest it did, then an alert should have been issued.

According to KP government authorities, the Met department is not equipped to issue proper forecasts for the mountainous regions, and all of KP province does not have any functioning weather radars. This is a dangerous situation because the mountains are particularly vulnerable to the vagaries of the weather, and water run-off from the mountains will always find its way into the rivers, just like it did in 2010. The past five years have taught us that the monsoon season is turning into a dangerous season, and only luck has ensured that thus far no major breaches of large hydrological infrastructure have occurred. Not only that, the nature of the threat is also multiplying. The many emergencies arising out of a changing climate are now knocking at our door with increasing ferocity. It is high time to realise that meeting this challenge is a critical priority. Investment needs to be made in upgrading forecasting capabilities, building on our current capability which relies almost exclusively on empirically observing weather patterns towards forecasts that use climatic models, and thereby providing longer lead times. We cannot afford to drive blind into the coming storms.

Published in Dawn, July 26th, 2015

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