Deadly Forecast
And everyone has access to that information?
Different governments disseminate their computer forecasts in different ways. The United States and Europe are leaders in that regard, so you can pull them up on the Web for free. In other parts of the world, there are some restrictions placed on the data being made available to the general public—there may be a fee, for example. The Joint Typhoon Warning Center is a government agency, primarily the Navy, that closely relates to other governments, and they covered the system. If you had gone on Google and looked up the JTWC, you would've seen it on there.
At what point did you realize it was going to be as bad as it turned out to be?
We knew up to 72 hours before the storm made landfall that it would be a major typhoon. It was already a significant storm. Within 72 hours, you have at least a moderate confidence that it's going to be within 100 miles, and within 48 hours it was pretty evident it was going to make landfall where it did.
Predicting where it was going to hit with precision seemed to have been particularly important with this storm. Could you explain why?
The Irrawaddy Delta is very, very low-lying. What happens with a cyclone that comes up and makes that curve to the right, it's almost as if it were coming into Tampa Bay. It's low-lying to begin with, and it's low-lying far inland, so you basically have a storm surge. Just to the right of the eye of the storm is where the worst storm surge is, where the highest waters are. With the combination of the low-lying river delta and this massive push of water with nothing to stop it, the flooding damage is evident quite a ways inland.
How does Burma's early-warning system compare with those of other countries in the region, such as Bangladesh, which supposedly put a good one in place since it's been hit so often with devastating storms?
I'm not aware of how many governments in the area heeded the warning, but this was out on the basic AP, UPI newswires days in advance. Typically, within 72 hours, you want to be in evacuation mode for a major typhoon like this. Bangladesh is known to have a very good early-warning system. India also has a very adequate system. Had this exact same system struck either one of those countries, there would have been much more time to prepare. But those countries are further developed in terms of infrastructure and warning services. You have to have infrastructure to get information like this out--whether it's through news agencies, inter- or intra-country newswires, the Web--but it's pretty much the media outlets. And that's why it's so unsettling in Myanmar, because this was a global news story. You would think the media there would have at least had a high-level notice this was coming.
Would you consider this cyclone "normal" for this time of year? Or was it exceptionally strong?
It was a stronger than average cyclone for this time of year. But that can happen. It's not out of the realm of possibility that you can have a supertyphoon like this. For this particular time of the year, no, it was above average in strength.
What about it hitting Burma rather than other areas on the coast of the Indian Ocean? Is it unusual for storms of this magnitude to hit there?
It is not unheard of, but it's not a track that happens frequently. They do see their share of landfall in typhoons there, but this particular one is not something that we would expect to see on the track it took last Friday.
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Member Comments
Posted By: oklahoma_republican_youth @ 05/12/2008 5:06:22 PM
Comment: ok.. in my opinion it doesnt matter where they thought it was going to hit..... they knew its potential.. they should of informed EVERYONE IN THAT COUNTRY AS WELL AS SURROUNDING ONES.. computers are man made.. they make mistakes.. and last time i checked we cant control nature.. so we can never be 100% sure that it will hit there or here.. look at New Orleans.. they underestimated the hurricane.. and the damage was outraging... i think the government in that country should be exiled.. and perhaps disappear... .they are going to go to a very hot place when they die.. and refusing aid into the country to help those who cant help themselves is ridiculous.... they know they wont die from the diseases and conditions like the "average citizen" but if the shoe was on the other foot they would be asking why their leaders werent suppling aid!!! ok so thats one of America's youths opinion.. rebuttal anyone!
Posted By: nyeinc @ 05/11/2008 12:43:20 AM
Comment: You can verify whether the public was informed or not by reading the newspaper in English available at mrtv3 dot net dot mm
Posted By: nyeinc @ 05/09/2008 5:35:36 PM
Comment: According to the official accounts -- as of 2:30 New York Time, May 6, 2008 ??? 22, 464 people died and 41, 054 people are missing.
Why is the death toll so high? The storm water surged over 12 feet. The houses in the delta region of my country are used to flooding and are constructed to cope with, say, 5-6 feet but not 12 feet. The bamboo and wooden houses can cope with 120 mile per hour wind, certainly NOT.
So, why is the death toll so high for such a cyclone?
Because the storm fell on the most densely populated regions of the country. Approximately 12 million people live in the two regions hit hardest, namely Yangon and Irrawaddy provinces.
The tropical storms called cyclones in Bay of Bengal usually had gone into Bangladesh. Even if the storms head towards Burma/Myanmar, they usually head toward a range of mountains in the West, which had given us a natural shelter. The storm of this direction and this magnitude is very rare. Its land fall was on the Southwestern flat land and was heading towards East. We didn???t expect such direction.
Most importantly, we don???t follow the weather news partly because the weather had never been severe and bad enough for us to follow and partly because the weather forecasts had never been reliably accurate (at least in our perception and memory). The weather forecasts say that it is going to rain today and it is sunny the entire day. The forecast says that it is going to be sunny today and we get a downpour. So, we don???t follow the weather forecast and take them seriously.
The storm warnings were issued by government-controlled radios, televisions and newspaper. Of course, the weathermen, like most Burmese, might have thought that it was going to be another tropical storm that would move towards Bangladesh or the Arakhan Range of Mountains. Then, it will subside later. This time we were wrong and our mistake is fatal.
Even if the storm victims had received the weather forecasts and taken it more seriously, they would have no place to hide. The bamboo houses they live are too weak to weather the 120-mph wind and 12-feet-high storm water. According to an eye witness, some people went to the monasteries, usually built in wood and concrete, but it didn???t help. The walls of the monastic building they took shelter collapsed onto them and they died.