3 killed, 370,000 evacuated from eastern coast as Cyclone Hudhud slams into India
PUBLISHED ON OCT 12, 2014 3:40 PM
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An Indian youth is pictured in the surf as large waves hit the beach ahead of Cyclone Hudhud making expected landfall in
Visakhapatnam on Oct 11, 2014. India placed its navy on high alert and evacuated around 350,000 people from eastern
coastal areas as it prepared for a severe cyclone to hit on Sunday, Oct 12. -- PHOTO: AFP
BHUBANESWAR, India (AFP) - At least three people were killed on Sunday when Cyclone
Hudhud slammed into India’s east coast, packing winds of almost 200 kmh, ripping down
power cables and forcing roads and railways to shut.
Around 370,000 people living along the eastern coastline were evacuated before the storm hit
around 11.30am on Sunday morning, as the authorities tried to avoid mass casualties.
“We have had three deaths since this morning,” said Mr Natrajan Prakasam, a Disaster
Management Commission official in the worst-hit state of Andhra Pradesh in south-east
India. Two people were crushed by falling trees, while the third was killed when a wall
collapsed in heavy rains, he told AFP.
India placed its navy on high alert and evacuated people from eastern coastal areas as it
prepared for the severe cyclone to hit on Sunday.
Cyclone Hudhud was expected to make landfall before noon local time, packing winds of
nearly 200km per hour.
Thousands of people living in flimsy housing in fishing villages in the eastern state of Andhra
Pradesh were among the first to be moved to concrete relief shelters, officials said. Mr
Arvind Kumar, a state government official in Andhra Pradesh, where the storm will hit first,
said 300,000 people had been evacuated there. "We are trying to minimise the movement of
people," he said as the storm gathered strength over the Bay of Bengal. "Six hours after
landfall will be very crucial, though the wind speeds will come down to about 100 kilometres
(per hour) by then."
Mr Prabhat Mohapatra, deputy relief commissioner for the neighbouring state of Orissa, said
nearly 50,000 people had been evacuated from there. "Some are being evacuated this
morning," he told Indian broadcaster NDTV. "We are worried about flooding here (Orissa)
and have depleted our water reservoirs by 50 per cent."
India's eastern coast and neighbouring Bangladesh are routinely hit by bad storms between
April and November that cause deaths and widespread property damage.
The authorities are keen to avoid a repeat of Cyclone Phailin, which killed at least 18 people
in Orissa last year and left a trail of destruction.
In 1999, more than 8,000 people were killed when a cyclone battered Orissa.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi chaired an emergency government meeting late on Saturday
to review preparations for the cyclone.
Some bus and train services in Andhra Pradesh and Orissa states have been cancelled, the
Press Trust of India (PTI) said.
The navy said it has "assumed a high degree of readiness" as "the severe cyclone Hudhud is
poised to strike".
Naval ships are standing by equipped with "divers, doctors, inflatable rubber boats, integral
helicopters and relief material," the statement said.
A nine-year-old girl drowned and a boy is missing after the boat that was evacuating them
from their coastal village capsized on Saturday, Andhra Pradesh Chief Secretary G C Patie
told PTI.
The authorities in Orissa have been working to evacuate members of the state's 7,000-strong
Bonda tribe from their age-old habitats in the Bonda Hills, expected to be particularly hard hit
by the storm.
But PTI said many were reluctant to move as they had never left the area.
"The identified 2,000 tribal people (who must move) have never come down the hills in their
lifetime," Mr Dambaru Sisa, a member of the state Parliament who belongs to the Bonda tribe,
told the agency.
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Eastern China set for record-hot summers: study
PUBLISHED ON OCT 13, 2014 1:45 AM
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PARIS (AFP) - By 2024, more than half of summers in eastern China will be as hot as in
2013, when the region was hit by a record-busting heatwave and devastating drought, a study
said Sunday.
Based on current global warming trends, the big heat will happen even if rising greenhouse
gas emissions are braked over the next decade, it said.
The summer of 2013 was the hottest on record in eastern China - a massive 1.1 degrees
Celsius above the long-term average.
On 31 days, the temperature reached or exceeded the heatwave benchmark of 35 degrees
Celsius - more than double the usual June-August tally.
Nine provinces, with half a billion inhabitants, were affected. Direct economic losses, in
China's most populated and economically developed region, have been put at 59 billion
renminbi (S$12.3 billion).
Reporting in the journal Nature Climate Change, scientists in Beijing, Canada and the United
States said the probability of a 2013-like summer in eastern China had increased by a factor
of 60 since the early 1950s.
Adding to the risk is the region's rapid urbanisation, they said.
They pointed to an effect called the urban heat island, in which concrete buildings and tarmac
roads store heat during the day but fail to shed it all at night, thus ratcheting up the daytime
temperature bit by bit.
The team, led by Xuebin Zhang of Environment Canada in Toronto, extrapolated
temperatures on the basis of the region's weather from 1955 to 2013 and on internationallyused simulations for global warming.
"By 2024, at least 50 per cent of summers will be as hot as the 2013 summer," they wrote.
The estimate holds for the lowest greenhouse-gas emissions, which yields a warming
scenario called RCP4.5, and for the highest emissions, called RCP8.5.
"The increase in summer heat would inevitably lead to more widespread, long-lasting and
severe heatwaves in the region," the paper warned.
"(...) Combined with the region's rising population and wealth, (it) would produce higher
risks for human health, agricultural systems and energy production and distribution systems if
sufficient adaptation measures are not in place."
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Car-free roads, short queues, and clean air: Positive side effects of Hong Kong protests
PUBLISHED ON OCT 12, 2014 11:43 PM
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A dog stands on an empty road outside the Central Government Office in Hong Kong on Oct 5, 2014. Hong Kong has been
plunged into the worst political crisis since its 1997 handover as pro-democracy activists take over the streets following
China's refusal to grant citizens full universal suffrage. -- PHOTO: AFP
BY RACHEL CHANG IN HONG KONG
EMPTY tables at restaurants usually booked up for weeks. Short lines at Disneyland. Clear air and blue
skies in the city centre.
Whatever your politics, it is difficult to deny that the two-week-long pro-democracy protest
has had some positive side effects.
Much has been made of the gridlocked traffic across the city and loss of income for local
business owners thanks to the protesters' blockading of main thoroughfares in Admiralty,
Causeway Bay and Mongkok.
But the dog-walkers, cyclists and picnickers who have enjoyed the free roads in the past two
weeks, buoyed by sunny late-summer weather, acknowledge a reluctance to see the roaring,
carbon-emitting vehicles return.
Young professionals have enjoyed the break from wading through bodies on the narrow
overhead bridges that connect Admiralty's skyscrapers, strolling along the eight-lane road
instead.
"It's given us a taste of what a more pedestrianised Hong Kong would be like, which would
be very nice," said communications consultant Harold Li, 26.
There is actually a proposal, put forth earlier this year by the city's Institute of Planners, to
turn the Des Voeux Road Central stretch into a pedestrianised path like Nanjing Road in
Shanghai or Wangfujing in Beijing.
But the government is worried about what this would mean for traffic congestion.
The protests have also been a godsend for determined foodies, who've found empty tables
instead of long lines at popular eateries located within or near the protest sites.
There are fewer tourists in town and locals are staying away due to traffic and safety concerns.
Where once stone-faced waiters stared in impatience as you swallowed your "stocking milk
tea" at Lan Fong Yuen restaurant, located in Central near the Admiralty protest site, over the
weekend, diners sipped their tea unhurriedly and chatted leisurely.
At nearby egg tart haven Tai Cheong bakery, however, the auntie manning the counter
answered a mite impatiently when this reporter asked if business had dropped due to the
protests.
There was no one behind me waiting to be served, but her impatient efficiency, honed in preprotest days, was unshakeable.
A group of Singaporean tourists whom I accosted at Lan Fong Yuen were delighted that their
trip had coincided with the protests.
"We were at Disneyland on Friday, and the lines were so short," explained executive
Michelle Lim, 29, who also works in the tourism industry back in Singapore. "The lack of
mainland tourists has really made a big difference."
Of course, those who depend on income from those tourists and those long lines would
dispute the positivity of these side effects.
And the student protesters whom I talked to suggested positive aspects that were endearingly
subjective if self-serving, such as "greater compassion and kindness in Hong Kong".
One young man named Endy Chen, 25, told me that I should look into the response rate
statistics of Hong Kong's ambulances in the past two weeks.
The student protesters manning the barricades of the roads let emergency vehicles through.
"I think that since there is no traffic here, they actually respond to calls faster! So more
people are saved," he said.
One set of statistics that can't be so easily spun show a positive side effect that no one, even
those squarely against the protest movement, can deny.
With vehicles banished from these thoroughfares, official readings have consistently shown
the health risk from air pollutants in those areas as low or moderate rather than the usual high.
There has also been a halving of the level of nitrogen oxide, emitted by diesel engines, in the
air in the past two weeks.
Whatever its achievements may end up being, the pro-democracy movement has already
shown Hong Kongers a vision of a pedestrianised city with clean air, uncrowded sidewalks
and fewer mainland tourists whose ubiquitous presence has caused tension between them and
Hong Kongers.
No wonder the government wants them to clear out.
rchang@sph.com.sg
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Typhoon Vongfong makes landfall on southern Japan island of Kyushu; 1 missing, dozens hurt
PUBLISHED ON OCT 13, 2014 8:26 AM
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Waves crash as Typhoon Vongfong approaches Japan's main islands while surfers try to ride a wave at Eguchihama Beach in
Hioki, Kagoshima prefectureon Oct 12, 2014. -- PHOTO: REUTERS
TOKYO (AFP) - Powerful typhoon Vongfong slammed into Japan on Monday morning, with
at least one person missing and dozens injured while more than 300 flights were grounded,
officials and local media said.
Winds of up to 180 kmh whipped ashore as the typhoon made landfall in Makurazaki on
Kyushu island at around 8.30am local time, the meteorological agency said.
Three Chinese people were engulfed by high waves triggered by the typhoon in Shizuoka,
central Japan, on Sunday afternoon, Japan’s public broadcaster NHK and the Mainichi
Shimbun said, adding that two of them were rescued but one was still missing.
NHK also said at least 44 people were injured in typhoon-related accidents, while Japanese
airlines cancelled at least 329 flights.
The typhoon came just a week after another strong tropical storm whipped through the
country, leaving 11 people dead or missing.
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Typhoon Vongfong hits Japan's Kyushu island, moves towards Honshu
PUBLISHED ON OCT 13, 2014 11:50 AM
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TOKYO (REUTERS) - Typhoon Vongfong hit Japan's southern island Kyushu earlier on
Monday and was expected to bear down on the main island Honshu later in the day, forcing
the cancellation of hundreds of flights, Japan's NHK broadcaster said.
The strongest storm to hit Japan this year has forced the evacuation of about 450,000 people
on the islands of Kyushu and Shikoku, as well as Okinawa which was hit by Vongfong on
Sunday, according to NHK.
Vongfong battered the southern Japanese island of Okinawa, 600 km south of Tokyo, as well
as Kyushu and Shikoku islands, injuring 52 people, NHK said.
On Sunday, wind speeds weakened significantly on Saturday's peak of 234 kmh hour (146
mph), which had made Vongfong into a "super typhoon". Japan Airlines Co spokesman said
92 flights connecting Japan's western cities and the eastern cities of Osaka and Tokyo had
been cancelled.
ANA Holdings Inc also cancelled flights flying in and out of the southern cities, according to
ANA website. A major baseball game in Osaka city between the Orix Buffaloes and the
Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters for the Pacific League playoff was also postponed, the first
time a Nippon Professional Baseball playoff game was canceled due to a typhoon.
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