Constant, Compounding Disasters Are Exhausting Emergency Response - a podcast by Circle Of Blue

This is an excerpt from Circle of Blue's July 12, 2021 episode of What's Up With Water.

The acceleration of disaster is repeating worldwide, in part because vulnerable people and developments are moving into terrain that is hazardous.  Landslides in the unstable Himalaya mountains in recent years have demolished newly built hydropower stations and killed hundreds. Over 200 were dead or missing this February from the Chamoli disaster there. 

But the acceleration is also occurring because a supercharged climate is churning up more powerful hurricanes, more punishing droughts, more oppressive heat waves, and altogether more environmental and water-related risk. António Guterres, the United Nations secretary general, emphasized that point last week at a special UN session on water and disasters. He said “Last year, cyclones lashed the shores of many countries that were already grappling with serious liquidity crises and debt burdens, made worse by the Covid-19 pandemic.”

The scenario that Guterres described — cyclone plus debt plus pandemic — is an example of what researchers call “compounding” or “cascading” disasters. These are disasters that build upon one another, their effects rippling across society.

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