Cyclone Sidr Update

November 15, 2007

 

 

Current Status

 

Tropical Cyclone Sidr (06B) made landfall on the southern coast of Bangladesh at approximately 3 p.m. local time (4 a.m. EST) today (Thursday, November 15, 2007) as a Category 4 storm with sustained winds reported between 130 mph (209 kph) and 150 mph (240 kph), according to multiple media reports. Coastal residents in low-lying areas of Bangladesh were warned of possible tidal surges later in the day, reaching heights of between nine feet (3 meters), according to CNN, and 20 feet (6 meters), according to Reuters. Bangladesh’s meteorological department said that most of the estimated 5 million people living in storm-vulnerable areas should already have been evacuated or taken cover when the cyclone hit. The Associated Press reported that a senior Bangladeshi government official had estimated that some 3.2 million coastal villagers had been evacuated before the storm hit. It is too early to determine casualty statistics or damage estimates and there has been no immediate call for outside assistance from the Bangladeshi government. More than 40,000 Bangladeshi policemen, soldiers, coastguards and health care workers were deployed along the coast Thursday, according to the BBC. The storm hit land in the Khulna-Barisal coastal areas, bringing heavy rains along with winds, the Meteorological Department reported. The storm was expected to affect areas from India’s eastern West Bengal state to the western coast of Myanmar to Bangladesh’s east along the Bay of Bengal. In a special bulletin, the Meteorological Department warned that the storm was likely to intensify as it moved inland in a northerly direction and head over heavily populated areas toward the capital, Dhaka. The cyclone began brewing Tuesday (November 13) in the Bay of Bengal, Reuters reported. Despite Thursday’s media reports, the Maui-based Pacific Disaster Center (PDC) said Wednesday (November 14) that Sidr would weaken very quickly as it moved inland, at least in terms of the associated wind speeds. Boaters and mariners in general should be giving a very wide berth to this storm, the PDC advised. Coastal residents and the population inhabiting all the low lying waterways in the area should be moving inland if possible. Communications are limited in this region, with many people living at sea level.

 

Background

 

Storms kill hundreds of people in coastal Bangladesh every year, but occasional severe cyclones kill hundreds of thousands. A cyclone and its subsequent tidal surge in 1991 killed 143,000 and destroyed thousands of homes, and a 1970 storm killed about a half a million people, Reuters reported.

 

International assistance was requested following tropical cyclone Marian (also unofficially known as Cyclone Gorky), which hit the Chittagong district of southeastern Bangladesh on April 29, 1991 with winds of 155 mph, killing more than 138,000 people. The storm caused an estimated $1.5 billion (1991 US dollars) in damage. Crops were destroyed and agricultural fields were flooded with ocean water, contaminating the soil and drinking water. In response, the United States military provided immediate practical assistance in emergency and short-term recovery operations by establishing a Contingency Joint Task Force and launching Operation Sea Angel. These efforts were credited with saving as many as 200,000 lives.

 

Country Profile

 

Bangladesh is one of the most disaster prone countries in the world due to its geographical location. With its economy heavily dependent on agriculture, the frequency of natural disasters such as floods, cyclones and accompanying storm surges, river-bank erosion, and drought, has hindered economic growth and poverty alleviation, thereby exacerbating the population’s vulnerability to risk.

 

Due to the regularity of major floods and cyclones, which hit the country on an annual basis, Bangladesh has in place a well-established and organized national disaster response structure integrating international aid organizations and on occasion foreign militaries.

 

Bangladesh’s traditional disaster management model focusing on disaster relief and recovery has evolved into a more holistic approach embracing the processes of hazard identification and mitigation, community preparedness, and integrated response efforts. As such, the Ministry of Relief and Rehabilitation was renamed to the Ministry of Food and Disaster Management (MoFDM) in 2003.

 

The Disaster Management Bureau (DMB) was created in 1992 to serve as a technical arm to the MoFDM, overseeing and coordinating all disaster management activities from the national to the grassroots level and maintaining liaison with government agencies, donors, and NGOs to ensure cooperation and coordination.

 

Although Bangladesh continues to strengthen its own capacity to handle wide-scale natural disasters, there will likely be future disasters where international humanitarian assistance is again requested. In Bangladesh and elsewhere, US interests would be well-served by an effective response to disasters. US military expertise and resources could be utilized not only to save lives, but also to possible prevent destabilization. While there has been considerable debate regarding the appropriateness of expanding the role of the US military vis-à-vis non-combat operations, the US military has a long history of humanitarian response and offers considerable assets to the humanitarian community. Coordination, however, between the military and non-governmental humanitarian community continues to be an area where improvement is needed.