Cyclone Nargis

Cyclone Nargis

• Struck Myanmar (correct name for Burma) on 2^nd May 2008
• At least 138,000 deaths. There are reports that suggest the Myanmar government stopped counting deaths after 138,000 to reduce political fallout
• Estimated damage equates to $10.2 billion (USD 2011),  the most damaging cyclone in the North Indian Ocean Basin
• Most deadly cyclone in the North Indian Ocean Basin
• Highest sustained winds (1 minute) 215 km/hr. 40 km/hr more than Hurricane Katrina
• Lowest pressure was 962 mbar

Why was this Cyclone so devastating?

• A category 4 storm is a force to be reckoned with even if you have a lot of disposable wealth and extra precautions. Myanmar has no such provisions; according to 2010 estimates (the government would never release proper figures) Myanmar are 170^th for GDP PPP per capita out of a total of 194 countries. They don’t have the resources to properly protect themselves from a category 4 cyclone.
• The militant communist government that runs Myanmar is typical of militant communist governments and doesn’t like any other nation entering the country. This prevented emergency teams from helping with the recovery effort. It also prevented aid from entering the country for almost a week. Only India and Bangladesh were allowed to enter the country after this period, western countries had significant more difficulty. Western countries were only allowed in from the 23^rd May onwards, 21 days after the disaster.
• The Sichuan 7.9 earthquake in China took place on the 12^th May meaning that relief efforts from countries had to be halved to assist with both disasters.
• Some critics described the disaster response from the military junta as genocide; the government did little to help those in most need and thus left them to die.

How did the government respond to the disaster?

A short, simple answer would be badly but since when have I simplified things?

• Naturally the first action to take when your country has been hit by a catastrophic cyclone is to deny access to anyone who’s trying to help. As crazy as it may seem this is what the military junta did; Myanmar doesn’t have a great human rights record so they were loathe to let any other nation in as they feared that their secrets would be revealed. They did this by making it nearly impossible to acquire a visa to enter the country, the only countries allowed in were their allies; India and Bangladesh and that wasn’t for about a week. ASEAN were next to be allowed in on the 19^th May and everyone else on the 23^rd but no military personnel were allowed in the country.
• This resulted in a vast amount of aid from the USA and other nations being undelivered as it was transported using military ships.
• Aid was also difficult to relay to the country and the people who needed it most. In the earliest days/weeks since the disaster the only way of getting aid into the country was to send the aid to India who would then transport it to the country. This came under huge political pressure from all leaders including Gordon Brown who said that Britain wouldn’t rule out going against the military junta and conducting forced airdrops of aid into the country.
• A black-market of aid goods was also taking place within the country; in response the government said on 15^th May that legal action would be taken against anyone found to be hoarding or trading in aid. By legal action I think they probably mean beating or ‘accidental death’. The corruption is illustrated when it emerged that high-energy biscuits were being stolen by the military from survivors.
• There were 5 high profile non-governmental organisations already in the country that were allowed to continue providing aid in the aftermath of cyclone Nargis. Examples are Save the Children and World Vision. Many other local NGOs switched to humanitarian efforts to mitigate the lack of recovery effort from the government.

As you can see the government didn’t really do much at all apart from to hinder the relief effort. Have some useful stats to show how little they helped:

• Over a week after the disaster only 1 in 10 survivors who were homeless, starving etc. had received assistance.
• After two weeks that had increased to about 25%
• Myanmar has vast amounts of paddies (rice growing fields) that are able to sustain its population. The UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation predicted that Nargis affected 65% of paddies. The increased risk of famine and starvation led to Myanmar requesting assistance.
• Although aid was given much never reached the intended targets. It is estimated that 209,000 families have rebuilt their homes without assistance or aid in the last year.

Stuff to link to SPEED

S – The death toll may have been vastly under-estimated by the government to make the disaster management look better.

P – The government went ahead with the planned referendum on the 24^th May despite the disaster. The fact that many people still didn’t have anywhere to live probably meant that voting figures were low.

E – The economic impacts of the disaster are much lower than that of hurricane Katrina however in proportion to the GDP of the nations it is much higher. Nargis caused just under a quarter of Myanmar’s GDP but Katrina only caused 153^rd of America's GDP

E – The disruption to paddies in Myanmar could prove catastrophic to the population, causing starvation and malnutrition.

D – Due to the lack of an official census in Myanmar hazard management is much more difficult to plan for thus casualty numbers will be increased.

The last case study before the exam…