paper - floods

8/3/2019 Paper - Floods

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Review of Sawat-Indus Flood 2010 (Pakistan)

Documentation, Lesson Learnt and a Way Forward

1) Dr. Muhammad Rizwan (PhD)

Associate Professor

National University of Science & Technology

(Risalpur Campus) Pakistan

2) Dr. Muhammad Jawed Iqbal (PhD) (Corresponding Author)

Associate Professor



[email protected]

3) Dr. Intikhab Ahmed Qureshi (PhD)

Dean



4) Muhammad Arshad

Assistant Professor



1
mailto:[email protected]:[email protected]


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Abstract

Pakistan has an area of 796,096 sq. km having a population about 170 million.

Pakistan is located in South Asia According to population Pakistan is the 9th largest

country in the world It is bounded by Iran,Afghanistan, Tajikistan, China and India.

Politically the country is divided into four provinces, Punjab, Sindh, North WestFrontier Province (NWFP) and Balochistan. Some areas have special status, which

include Federally Administrated Tribal Area (FATA), Federally Administrated

Northern Area (FANA) and disputed State of Azad Jammu and Kashmir with India.

Pakistan is located in arid or semi arid region where rainfall is highly deficient and

does not match the crop requirement. The Climate of Pakistan is described as

predominantly desert or near desert with half the country receiving less than 250 mm

average annual rain fall. Zones of relatively high precipitation with 200 mm being

received north of the country. Temperature remains with maximum between 40 o C to

48oC in the plain areas where as minimum between 4

o

C to 6

o

C.

Flooding is a major problem in Pakistan and is most extensive and damaging in the

Indus Plain. Damage also occurs in areas along small rivers with relatively steep

catchments causing flash floods. Major flood events result from excessive flows

within the Indus River basin, including the Indus itself and its main tributaries,

namely the Jhelum, Chenab, Ravi, Sutlej and Kabul rivers.

Melting snow from the mountains combined with monsoon rains (generally from July

to September) cause heavy flooding and riverbank erosion. Floods have resulted in

loss of life and substantial damage to property, infrastructure and agriculture (Hit

usually poorest segment of society suffers the greatest).

Flood hazards and riverbank erosion that adversely affect human settlements,

infrastructure and farming areas have to be minimized so that Pakistans

predominantly rural communities in flood-prone areas can sustain increases in

agricultural production, employment and incomes.

This paper presents an overview of the devastating floods that hit the Pakistan in July

2010 and affected a large number of people and a large area of the country.

Thousands of people displaced and damage costs around several billion of dollars.

Key words: Flash floods, devastation, flood management

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Review of Sawat-Indus Flood 2010 (Pakistan) Documentation,

Lesson Learnt and a Way ForwardIntroduction

The geographical location of Pakistan makes it much vulnerable to the natural

disasters. Its proximity from tectonic plate boundaries, Eurasian-Indian in the north

and Arabian-Indian in the west, makes it vulnerable to seismic activity. The existence

of Himalayan in north has great influence on its weather including heavy precipitation

which mostly occurs during moon soon seasons. At times the concurrent occurrence

of different precipitation systems, in northern areas of the country, cause heavy

floods. Due to a similar phenomenon the country is facing biggest crises of her

history due to recent floods. Over the history it has been realized that floods cause

destruction either due to insufficient defense system or in case of failure of any such

structure which is part of the defense system. In the former a strict balance has to be

maintained between the acceptable losses after the floods and the expenditurerequired in establishing a defense system. Unfortunately, in Pakistan in most of the

cases no such deliberation has been carried out and if at all any such effort was made

it could not find consensus among different stake holders. The recent flooding of

swat, Kabul and Indus Rivers has claimed 1600 lives and has left about 21 million

people affected [1]. The damages to residential structures, commercial structures and

public infrastructures including schools, hospitals, roadways, railways and many other

utilities. Events are still unfolding and many foreseen and unforeseen parameters are

affecting the estimates.

Two main factors which have major impact on mitigation of a natural disaster

include 1) an accurate and timely anticipation of losses, while the events are still

unfolding and 2) availability of premeditated and well established post disaster eraschemes which could take in to account all the stake holders. Reasonable results could

be achieved by employing the templates developed during similar events else where

in the world, however, the divergences have to be pointed out and taken into account.

Moreover, the exact estimation of natural disaster is greatly dependant on the size of

the event and relative wealth of the populace and it will be very rare that these factors

match. Most accurate models are found to be those which were developed for a

particular region based on its indigenous data of the disasters and their related events.

Therefore, each catastrophe has a great deal of important information associated with

it. This information not only assist in mitigating the affects of existing disaster but

also help in developing such models which could eliminate recurrence of such mega

losses from a similar disaster. The importance of gathering and optimum utilizationof this information can be felt from a fact that "IF LOST" its provision would only be

possible through a disaster and loses of same magnitude.

During the disaster and even in the rehabilitation phase most of the resource of

a country is lined up and committed towards managing the losses and affected. It is

the academias which is required to analytical review the disaster and suggest models

which could not only mitigate the affects of an in hand disaster but also help in

developing mitigation and rehabilitation schemes for future occurrences. Civil

Engineers, being associated to most of the infrastructure of both private and public

sectors, have their well recognized role during the natural catastrophe. NUST College

of Civil Engineering recognizes this role and responsibility and has decided to get

involve in the process of rehabilitation and analytical reviews in order to ensure a

healthy academia input. The name for the disaster has been suggested as Swat-Indus

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Floods 2010. The name is drawn from the name of two main Rivers which has taken

the bulk volume of the huge precipitation which has occurred in the northern areas.

This paper gives a short rundown of the event and list down the research titles

specifically designed to cover major aspects of Swat-Indus floods 2010 such as

documentation, lessons drawn and a way forward. The conclusions drawn out of the

suggested research proposal will be useful for different stake holders involved inmonitoring before flood, rescue during flood and rehabilitation after a flood event.

Rundown of the Events

It all started in 3rd week of July with heavy rain falls occurring in Sibi, Kohlu

and Barkhan districts of Balochistan [2, 3]. Mainly it was torrential rains which

caused large destruction in these districts. These districts affected due to Nari River,

which carried a flood of 1, 20,000 cusecs. Later Talli bank was breached due to

breach in Talli bank of Nari River was breached which caused flooding of many

villages of Sibi district. By 25th Jul 30 were reported dead and more then 20 were

missing in the three districts. The situation further aggravated due to damage of the

Tanga Dam in Kohlu. In total 5124 families were affected by the flood [3]. Figure1(a) show the location of the three affected districts and location of Nari River is from

Sibi is indicated in figure 1(b).

(a) (b)

Figure 1: Affected Districts of Balochistan due to flooding of Nari River (a)

Sibi, Kohlu and Barkhan Districts and Nari River (b) Nari River and Sibi District

Met department of Pakistan reported that the Monsoon will give precipitation more

then usual. In Khyber Pakhtunkhwa 25 districts in total has been affected by thefloods [3a], which are shown in figure 2. In total 1, 72, 433 houses have damaged in

the province [3b]. About 400,000 people have been reported to be affected by the

floods. The major damage has occurred to Sawat, Lower Dir, Upper Dir, Charsadda,

Nowshera, Tank and DI Khan. From 26th to 29th Jul 100 mm to 300 mm rain fall has

been recorded in different parts of the province. These floods are identified as the

worst floods since 1929 [3a].

The rainfall in Swat was continues from mid June and Swat river was already

following at 60000 Cusecs, which is double of their double of its normal capacity of

30000 Cusecs [4]. Therefore, with addition of the water due to 27th Jul 2010 and

onward rains the swat river totally went violent. Due to flooding of Swat River and

related hill torrents district Swat, Dir Lower, Malakand, Dir upper and Chitral were

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SIBIKOHLU

Barkhan


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Figure 2: Flood affected districts of Khyber PakhtunKhawa province with reported

account of dead and injured

severely affected. The estimated damage by PDMA of Khyber Pakhtunkhawa

indicates a total life loss 246 and 259 injured are reported injured. In total 95 villages

of the districts very severely damaged or completely washed away. The flood has left

4,50,000 population inaccessible due to completely washing away of road

infrastructure and damaging of 186 bridges and culverts [5]. As report of Save the

Children [6] the road Mingora to Khwazakhela which leads to Madyam , Bahrain andKalam was completely washed away and number of places. Also, total of 26 major

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bridges have been reported to severely damage [6]. In figure 3 a view of damages

observed in Sawat is presented.

(a) (b)

Figure 3: Affected Districts of Sawat due to flooding of Sawat River (a) Collapsed

bridge over river Sawat (b) Collapsed houses due to slope failures at bank of river

Sawat in Madayan

(a) (b)

Figure 4: Flood situation of Charsadda (a) Temporary water point established by

Military College of Engineering Risalpur at Charsada (b) Bridge over River Kabul

(a) (b)

Figure 5: Flood situation of Charsadda (a) View of demolished village at outskirts of

Charsada (b) Veiw of a collapsed typical mud house

On 28th Jul the flood reached Charasada and there was no sufficient warning,

therefore, the affects were similar to a flash flood [7]. Most of the sufferers had left

nothing to support them. Reports indicate that more then 5000 houses and 20 villages

were under the water. The biggest problem was non availability of clean drinkingwater due to which different diseases started to breakout and epidemic was expected.

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This issue was timely and well taken care of by Military College of Engineering in

Risalpur by establishing temporary water points at different location in the city. The

temporary water point is shown in figure 4(a). Out of a total population 1.431 million

1, 45,810 people have reported to be displaced [5]. Total of 34,6,47 houses has been

damaged and it is estimated that total of 71,819 house holds are affected. In addition

to household major damage has occurred to infrastructure in terms of 3 bridges and 34major roads. The road Charsadda-Peshawar was closed due to Damage Bridge. Also,

bridge over River Kabul near Charsadda was also damaged shown in figure 4(b). In

figure 5(a) and 5(b) represents the kind of damage which has occurred to the houses

in region.

(a) (b)

Figure 6: Flood relief activity at Nowshera (a) View of first relief camp established by

Military College of Engineering Risalpur at Government College of Technology,

Nowshera (b) Veiw of health center rehabilitated by Military College of Engineering

Risalpur

(a) (b)

Figure 7: Affects of floods in Nowshera (a) Flooding water in the city (b)Veiw of a collapsed brick masonary structure due to crumbling of the supporting soil

structure

The furious River Kabul after flooding Charsadda city and it out skirts then

headed for Nowshera. The Nowshera, which is existing on both the banks of Kabul

River, is also one the severely affected regions of the province. OCHA has included

Nowshera in list of worst hit areas [8]. After the start of the event the first issue in

hand was to estabilish a system which could assist different donors and organization

to reach the affected. Military College of Engineering, Risalpur took the initiative

and established the first relief camp in Government College of Technology,

Nowshera. In Khyber Paktunkhwa total of 34 health centers were severely damage.The threat of out break of epidemic emphasized rehabilitation of the health centers.

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Again Military College of Engineering took the initiative and rehabilitated the health

center of Nowshera. The first relief camp established by Military College of

Engineering is shown in figure 6(a) and the rehabilitated health center is shown in

figure 6(b). The health center after operation supported approx 1000 individuals per

day. Military College of Engineering Risalpur also organized support of volunteer

doctors for the health center. A total of 167 people have been reported dead and 3,50,336 were displaced out of total of 1.226 million population. Total 27 villages have

been severely affected and 67940 houses are damaged [5]. Pabbi has been worst hit

area due flash flood from the adjacent hill torrents. Reportedly, total of 17 union

council of Pabbi have been damaged. The view of flood in Nowshera is given in

figure 7(a) and type damage observed in houses is shown in figure 7(b).

(a) (b)

Figure 8: Affects of damming of water at Khairabad (a) Up to Akora (b) Up to

Nowshera

Figure 9: Affects of flooding of water in central Punjab area

At Khairabad flood enters the Punjab province. Before entering Punjab, at

Khairabad, water from Kabul and Indus together passes through a gorge. As inflow at

Khairabad reached a level of 11 lac cusecs it started to dam the water in the channel

due to which area along banks of river Kabul between Nowshera and Khairabad was

flooded. The affects of damming are shown in figure 8(a) and the affects observedaround Nowshera is shown in figure 8(b). At Khairabad and Attock there was

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contribution from local hill torrents which added up to the damages. However, only

those areas, which are located on the bank of the river, are affected. In Attock, total

of 24 Km of road network has been affected due to damage of retaining and drainage

structure [7b]. As the water at Khairabad receded the flood levels in Nowshera started

to reduce.

Figure 10: Flooding of different districts of Sindh province

The damage in Punjab started to occur by 02 Aug 2010. In Punjab the major

damage has occurred in Bhakkar, Dera Ghazi Khan, Layyah, Mianwali,

Muzaffargarh, Rahim Yar Khan and Rajanpur districts. As per an estimate 6 million

has been affected. A total of 500000 houses and 850000 house holds has been

affected.[7c]. Main damage in agriculture has occurred to Cotton, Fodder, Pulses,

Sugarcane and Rice crops. The losses due to these damages have been estimated up

to 80.73 billion. .Total 6.65 million of animals have been affected out of which 3572

are reported to be dead. Total of 663 poultry farms have been destroyed and total of11,00,000 Lacs birds are reported to be dead during the floods. The total damage

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which has occurred in the adversely affected districts alone has been approximately

estimated to be 70 billion rupees. In addition to the adversely affected districts

damage has also occurred in Hafizabad, Sargodha, Chiniot, Mandi Bahawaldin,

Multan, Bahawalpur and Bahawalnagar districts. The spreading of flood water in

central Punjab is indicated in figure 9.

It was 4th Aug 2010 when people in Sindh started bracing themselves to face

the affects of impending floods. The mega flood in the Sindh provinces disrupted the

life completely in the affected areas. The districts of Sukkur, Kashmore Kandhkot,

Jacobabad, Shikarpur and Thatta districts were flooded due to a breach in the Tori

bund. The breach resulted devastation at mass scale by destroying different towns

and washing away thousand of villages. A major loss has occurred to standing crops

and infrastructure. In addition to the above districts, Ghotki and Khairpur have also

been severly affected. The major part of the population of these districts was

displaced. The majority of people were without any clean drinking water and food for

days. The flood after causing devastation to the areas of Kashmore, Kandhkot,

Shikarpur, Jacobabad, Ghotki, Sukkur, Khairpur and Dadu headed for submergingThatta. Three tehsil of the district were completely submerged in water. Media has

viewed that thousands of people were sitting in open waiting for any assistance that

might come to them. The location of Thatta is such that River Indus is flowing

through the district. Most of the settlements of the districts have stick to the sides of

the River. The major damage has occurred to towns of Sujawal, Bathoro, Daro,

Jattahi and Mir pur Bathoro were over run with the flood water. As per an estimate

about 15000 people were trapped in these towns, which were later rescued. The

HANDS organization has reported that more than 85000 people were stuck in

Shikarpur, Jacobabad, Ghotki and Sukkur districts [9aa]. Later Jaferabad districts

were also flooded with water. As per UN about 2 million acre of land in Sindh was

completely under water. The flooding of the different towns continued until 8th Sep

2010, after which no flooding of any major town was reported. When the water

started to exert pressure on embankments within 5 Kms of Dadu, then irrigation

authorities breached a band to let the water reach directly to the Manchar lake. Later

Manchar lake also swelled and it affected towns of Jamshoro districts. The floods

have displaced 7 million people in Sindh [8aa]

The loss as estimated by the Provincial government is 520 billion rupees. The

crops including rice, cotton, wheat, sugarcane besides others had completely been

destroyed in the province while on the account of rice crop alone the countrys

precious foreign reserves would face a loss of 1800 million dollars. A major damagehas occurred to road infra structure of the province. Road Karachi-Kot was disrupted

due to major damage occurring at various sections, in total 127 Km of the road was

either completely washed or suffered an irreparable damage. The other roads which

suffered major damage included Kotri-Kashmore, Sukkur-Jacobabad and Retodero-

Shadad-Kot. In addition to these road Karachi-Hyderabad motorway also came under

water but later it was restored. Figure 10 shows flooding of different districts of

Sindh province.

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.

Figure 11: Extents of flooding in Pakistan due to Sawat-Indus floods 2010

Lessons Learnt

Due to flooding of settled regions the complete ecosystem is disturbed. After

the floods the major focus shifts to managing the rehabilitation affairs. Every mega

disaster has its own distinct dynamics and is dependant on the environments in which

the disaster has occurred. Each disaster has something new to teach; therefore, just by

going through the chronology of the recent floods few very important lessons can be

drawn. These are discussed as under:-

1. Damages

The floods have caused damage to almost all types of structures. Bridges,

Road sections, residential buildings and commercial buildings are main categories of

damaged structure. In the rehabilitation phase repair/reconstruction of residential

buildings is most important because these serve as first mile stone for populace to

recuperate from their losses. The damage in these types of buildings has been

observed mainly due to mud mortar used in the masonry work and mud house

construction. The weight of the mud roofs increased due to soaking and served as

catalyst in causing collapse. At places it has been observed that the damage occurred

due to improper design of the foundation. The soil under the foundations, which were

exposed to flooding water, eroded there by causing the structures to collapse. It hasbeen observed that the colonies where cement mortar was used as binder and rock

masonry foundations were properly laid with cement mortar suffered lesser damage.

The flow velocity has, however, a sure role to play in damaging of structures.

2. The regime of the Rivers and Extents of its flooding at various flow levels

As the flood started, its flow levels and destruction was intimated to the stake

holders of downstream regions. However, at downstream a situation of chaos

aroused. The main reason was that the stake holders could not translate the affect of a

particular flow level correctly. At places such as Muzaffargarh an issued warning was

once cancelled and then reissued. At the time of first warning the authorities could

not clearly define the safe regions for the displaced populace. Due to which theaffected were asked to shift again and again. It not only caused inconvenience but

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many lose their moral and will to survive during the natural disaster. Such important

information, which can relate the extent of flooding with level of flow, is best

available during actual flooding. Therefore, it should be collected deliberately and

pattern of flooding, linked with flow level, must be established.

3. Course of actions adopted by public sectorThe districts along the river banks did have any laid down procedures or drills

in order to respond to a flood situation. Mostly the public sector was kept informed

about the developing situation; however, in Khyber Pakhtunkhuwa due to hilly terrain

the reaction time was either very less or not available. The damages in Nowshera

districts, due to recent floods, indicate that there has been a major lack of coordination

at all tears of public sectors. The affected were totally unaware of the impending

devastation. From the initial surveys and analysis indicates that there was no

expertise available that could analyze the situation at hand and accordingly warn the

vulnerable. Similar, situations have been observed in other districts of the country as

well. Therefore, we need to establish the short falls in our response system and

develop a scheme whose implementation could eliminate the identified mistakes.

4. Need of water regulating structures

Visualization of flow levels indicate that water regulating structures, which

can take on probable level of floods, should be constructed over regimes of main

water channels. It has been observed that in addition to the flow coming from

particular regions additional flows, from hill torrents, kept on adding to the over flood

flow. The hill torrents which are occurring between two measuring stations are not

measured. In case sites for large water reservoirs are not available then the water can

be regulated by means of series of small structures. The number and size of structures

can be defined depending on the site restriction and estimation of flooding.

5. Response of Soil Structure

Soil behavior is greatly dependant on the quantity of water present in the soil.

During the floods as the started to rise the behavior soil structure started to change.

At places bearing capacity was found as low as 0.1 Tons/Sqft. But affected populace

is still unable to decide about the rehabilitation of the supported structure. The

regions along banks should be divided in to zones depending upon similar soil

properties. Generalized remedial and preventive measures should be highlighted for

each such area for use of populace because during post disaster everyone may not get

access to technical persons for solutions.

6. Miss coordination between stake holders

The miss coordination between Flood Commission of Pakistan and irrigation

department resulted heavy damages. Along Tori bund, in Sindh province, there was

warning of at least two days. The locals of the affected areas on self help managed to

control the spilling water but due to lack of resources they could not manage it.

According to media report irrigation department did not mobilize their resources to

protect areas existing along the bund.

Way Forward

After a natural disaster the main focuses is towards rehabilitation. However,

the phase is long and requires consistent and meticulous efforts in order to optimizeupon the time and resources. The aftermaths of every event are different and are

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greatly affected by the environment socioeconomic dynamics of the region where the

disaster has occurred. Therefore, any system development for a particular region

cannot be applied, as such, on any other location. The planning phase should start

before an impending disaster using the estimated values of controlling parameters.

The plans can then be edited and modified as the situation unfolds and real time data

of the event is received. In the light of the analysis of the rundown and lessons learntof event given above a way forward is listed below.

1. Policy Documentation

2. Division of Affected areas

3. Reconstruction

3. Role of Public sector

4. Role of NGOs

5. Academia Interaction

6. Remedial Measures

Conclusions

The data presented in this paper highlights the level of devastation caused bythe recent floods. The themes of the project offered will be helpful in establishing an

academia, industry and stake holder's linkage. The conclusion drawn out of the

proposed projects will be useful in research, flood risk management, reconstruction

and rehabilitation in the flood affected areas.

Reference

1. Report no 22, OCHA 6 September 2010

2. Monsoon 2010 Situation Report No 2; Pakistan Red Crescent Society; 23 Jul

2010.

3. Monsoon 2010 Situation Report No 32; Pakistan Red Crescent Society; 25 Jul

2010.

3a. report of 29 Jul 2010

3b. report 9 augst.

4. River Swat Flood situation

http://www.syfswat.org/pdf_reports/20.pdf

[99aa] report number 6

5. Summary of losses and damages, provincial disaster management authority

PDMA, government of KPK, http://pdma.gov.pk/Flood_2010/situation.php

6. Rapid Assessment Report of Flood-Affected Communities in Swat District,

Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan: Monitoring, Evaluation and Accountability Unit:

Save the Children: Aug 3, 2010.

7. http://pakobserver.net/201008/15/detailnews.asp?id=47080

7b. http://floodrelief.punjab.gov.pk/RoadStatistics.aspx

7c. http://floodrelief.punjab.gov.pk/DamagRain.aspx

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http://www.syfswat.org/pdf_reports/20.pdfhttp://pdma.gov.pk/Flood_2010/situation.phphttp://pakobserver.net/201008/15/detailnews.asp?id=47080http://floodrelief.punjab.gov.pk/RoadStatistics.aspxhttp://floodrelief.punjab.gov.pk/DamagRain.aspxhttp://www.syfswat.org/pdf_reports/20.pdfhttp://pdma.gov.pk/Flood_2010/situation.phphttp://pakobserver.net/201008/15/detailnews.asp?id=47080http://floodrelief.punjab.gov.pk/RoadStatistics.aspxhttp://floodrelief.punjab.gov.pk/DamagRain.aspx


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8. Report 1st August 2010.

[8aa] report no 22. 6 sep

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIMb5iPyzHA

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