The PM did not appear on television nor on other media to alert the people, which he could have done online even from the US. Nor did the chief ministers and mayors appear prominently in public
Death is said to be a great leveller. It does not differentiate between the rich and the poor. Nor does it discriminate between large and small. Whether it be a huge elephant or a tiny ant, both have to succumb to death one day. Disasters are also great levellers. They also do not distinguish between the haves and have nots. Consequently, two hurricanes, Helene and Milton, struck Florida, the eastern coast of the rich United States in quick succession within a span of a fortnight. Similarly, early and late monsoon created havoc in poor Nepal killing several people. It also did not spare a medium income country like India where rampant floods swept several parts of the country.
The destruction due to disasters are attributed to the lack of preparedness. The go as usual mindset of the country also is responsible for this depressing state of affairs. The glaring example is the flood and landslide that swept across Nepal September end. The Department of Hydrology and Meteorology had warned of such an event. In fact, it was known much before that the country would receive more than average rainfall this year. But the preparedness was half-hearted. It was at best a lip service. The warning was not followed by execution on the ground to the extent that buses continued to ply the streets even at night time. As a result, a few of them were engulfed by the landslide in Jhyaple Khola killing several people.
If we see in the United States, the preparedness was not only in word but also in deed. The governors and mayors alerted the people through different media such as television to such an extent that all the television channels appeared like hurricane TV. To ensure that everybody had moved to the shelters, people went knocking at the door of each and every family. President Joe Biden did not mince words when he said that evacuation had to be done immediately in the wake of Hurricane Milton. Senior meteorologists warned the people highlighting the gravity of the situation.
But in our country, the Prime Minister was in the United States attending the UN conference, whose significance was trivial compared to the disaster in the country. He did not appear on television nor on other media to alert the people, which he could have done online even from the US. Nor did the chief ministers and mayors appear prominently in public. When a person was about to be drowned in the flood waters of Milton hurricane, a helicopter rescued it and was transmitted live on television. But our saviours, the Nepal Police and the like, appeared late at the disaster spots. People were dependent on individuals like Chunilal Tamang who rescued a few people displaying incredible courage and enthusiasm.
The United States is very vulnerable to hurricanes. One to 2 hurricanes make a landfall in this country every year. The damage is colossal, with the three most destructive events costing more than 100 billion US dollars. Milton began as a low intensity hurricane but later strengthened almost to the highest possible Category 5 when it made landfall. Fortunately, it was not as harsh as it was predicted to be. Still 16 people lost their lives although the people had taken resort to the shelters.
Two weeks earlier, hurricane Helene multiplied several-fold to Category 4 when it was a mere 1 intensity hurricane. The number of deaths exceeded over 250. Florida was thus battered by two hurricanes over a fortnight. Scientists have ascribed it to climate change. Such a hurricane in pre-industrial times, they said, would not rain so much nor would it be so fast. Nepal was also dealt a double blow first after the monsoon started and then when it had almost reached its fag end.
It will be interesting to see how politics perceives these disasters. In the United States, former President Donald Trump accused the federal government for its carelessness and using the resources for the migrants more than on the natives. He also said that it provided relief to the Democratic voters and not to the Republicans. Trump was at its worst when he said that some unidentified bureaucrats controlled the weather and wielded it as a weapon.
The Opposition party in Nepal, the Maoist Centre, and the National Independents also fired political salvos at the government. Maoist Chairman Prachanda said that the government's response was inadequate, and it did not take immediate action. What he said was not wrong, but people wished that he had initiated such steps when he was at the helm for a long period of time. During the Jajarkot earthquake also, he made a visit to the affected site immediately after the quake, but later the victims were left to shiver in the chilly winter and sweat profusely in the summer heat.
The similarity that one sees in these disasters is the vagaries of climate change in both the hurricanes and the monsoon rains. The dissimilarity is the high preparedeness in the United States in stark contrast to the very little or none in Nepal. Political vibes have been more pronounced in the United States to the state of incredibility and even falsehood. Nepali criticism was not off the mark in view of the government's failure to follow up earnestly despite receiving warnings in time. The contrast is however significant in the financing in the aftermath of the hurricanes in the US followed by inadequately little in the case of Nepal.
Both the governments, in particular the Nepali government, have to be more prepared as such disasters are likely to be frequent in the future due to global warming taking place in brisk pace. The warming of the sea creates water vapour which manifests in disasters like hurricanes, floods and landslides.
