Torrential rain causes flooding in Kyushu; hospital isolated

Thoughts are with the people of Kyushu.

godspeed to the SDF in rescuing safely as many lives as they can.

Brace for it. What meteorologists call "linear rain band" is moving from western Japan toward the eastern Pacific coast. All the Japanese archipelago is being drenched in torrential rain. Abnormal weather caused by global warming caused by increasing carbon dioxide caused by man's insatiable thirst for comfortable modern way of life seems to be an undeniable fact.

LDP, this is not ‘drama’. This is reality. - You should have ALREADY have ‘a plan in the works’ for such an eventuality. - No more failures should be tolerated by Japan’s people!

Hate to think about what this will do to the number of COVID-19 cases, which were already rising so quickly.

If global natural disasters are the end results of man’s insatiable economic activities, then the philosophy, either communist or capitalist, that material wellbeing is good for a man has something seriously wrong for starters.

It rained a lot here in Kumamoto but not nearly as much as in northern Kyushu, then the band moved to southern Kyushu and has considerably weakened. Dodged a bullet. A go-to site for weather is the Japan Meteorological Agency. I particularly like their radar page; not only can one spot whether big rain is coming, one can identify the, say, 20-minute gaps when it won't be raining so as to run out for errands. http://www.jma.go.jp/jma/index.html

Suspect they might need a bit more than a brolly.

Hopefully all those at risk can be evacuated to safety.

GoodToday  06:34 am JST

Hate to think about what this will do to the number of COVID-19 cases, which were already rising so quickly.

That's what I was thinking as well. All that moolah on the Olympics (which should've been postponed anyway) would've been a big help toward relieving the people in Kyushu and area right now. This is the last thing the vpeople there need.

snowymountainhellToday  06:31 am JST

godspeed to the SDF in rescuing safely as many lives as they can.

Prayers, support, logistics, assistance and luck for the SDF - they will need them all. I hope and pray they can rescue and save as many lives as possible.

You are of course right as always, no doubt, this is the first bigger rain in millions of years and it is caused by bad humans and their existence and economic lifestyle, global warming, climate change and maybe even some additional tears from extraterrestrial aliens. (Irony)

God, give Japan a break!

@joffy

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WLjkLPnIPPw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=weQ-N4iymrQ&lc=Ugxi9IHlGfPajQdL6SV4AaABAg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V5fncpSikwk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tq2Wv2KHGBc

These videos address the "natural cycles" misinformation.

For a video that adresses the links between the increasing intensity of wildfires in Europe and Australia and anthropogenic climate change, watch this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t0x46-enxsA

If anyone remembers, the yearbefore we had a month of almost straight rain and clouds (with many floods and lost lives) followed by a July without a day of rain and intense sun everyday.

There were several very deadly heat waves during that time as well.

This is the biggest problem right now, and it will get worse and worse every years.

JSDF must be deployed in full force to help people.

It's a shame but, people only seem to take the threat of climate change seriously when it becomes a visible problem and directly affects their lives. Which is the case with the massive floods that bombarded Northern Europe and the fires raging across Southern Europe.

I particularly like their radar page; not only can one spot whether big rain is coming, one can identify the, say, 20-minute gaps when it won't be raining so as to run out for errands

I wouldn't say they have it down to quite that level, I've been drenched on my bike a couple of times after aiming for a window in the JMA cloud animation, but modern weather forecasts are really good now. They are not forecasts, but the webcams on the roads are also useful in that they can tell you if it is raining 10km away, 20km away etc. For me, quite often it isn't, and means I can get out with the kids when its raining at our place.

Our place has had 200mm in just over 48 hours, but parts of Kyushu had over one meter! The people there have done well to engineer towns that can withstand that.

joffy,

The premise on which I'm arguing is that humans must sustain normal life for an indefinite period in the future.

Now, you say carbon dioxide filled the earth's atmosphere many times more hundreds of millions of years ago. Is what you want to say abnormal weather has come and gone in a cyclic fashion in the earth's long history? Did human beings, or mammal of any sort, exist hundreds of millions of years ago?

Well, the rain has finally stopped coming down where I am and I'm gonna go take a walk!

I was talking with my parents in Canada yesterday. I was sitting in a city that was being flooded with disastrous rainfall, they were in one being choked from smoke from forests burning all around them.

Our governments need to rapidly reduce GHG emissions right now, no more bloody excuses.

If global natural disasters are the end results of man’s insatiable economic activities, then the philosophy, either communist or capitalist, that material wellbeing is good for a man has something seriously wrong for starters.

You're overanalyzing. Global warming is caused by excessive carbon emissions, or so the science says. Emissions that will be greatly reduced once we move to EV and renewable forms of energy. Man does not have to give up a modern lifestyle. We just need to improve energy and waste management.

@darknuts

As much as support the transition towards green energy, I can't help but question the way activists and policy makers want to solve the problem.

Like why do the same people who want to end coal power also support the decomissioning of nuclear powerplants, even though modern (generation 4) designs with passive safety provide the most powerful and reliable non-intermittent power, that could easily work alongside wind and solar.

And then there is the whole push to transition the auto industry to EV's with Lithium ion bateries that end up being harmful to the enviornment. Which is acceptable, but there is nothing being done to build up public transport, which is far more effective at reducing the number of gas guzzling cars on the road.

I hope everyone stays safe.

darknuts

You're overanalyzing. Global warming is caused by excessive carbon emissions, or so the science says. Emissions that will be greatly reduced once we move to EV and renewable forms of energy. Man does not have to give up a modern lifestyle. We just need to improve energy and waste management.

So, what is it? EIther the apocalyptic version that we are all doomed unless the whole world stops fossil fuel consumption, or your moderate suggestion that we should improve energy and waste management (something that nobody could disagree with).

By the way, when you look at most of the "solutions" that our progressive media and pols are touting (EV production, wind mills, solar panels etc). what they mean in real life is simply moving production, pollution, and fuel consumption to China. "Not in my backyard" would make sense if China was on another planet, but it is not.

WilliB, the apocalyptic vision is if we do nothing, the moderate view of mobius217 is a path to mitigating the apocalyptic vision.

While we need to transition away from fossil fuels this can’t happen over night and some of the much touted alternatives have their own environmental and social problems, especially battery EV’s. Sadly there are no simple solutions to complex problems despite what politicians might tell you. Nuclear is going to be part of the solution, we have no other choice, but that doesn’t mean it need be as dangerous as the existing legacy reactors or designs merely evolved from them (they were designed for making bomb materials not power generation, you just can’t make a silk purse out of a pigs ear!) but there are liquid salt designs that are walk away safe.

Hydrogen has an image problem though it’s safer than petrol, though there are technical problems to its implementation but these are just engineering, something we clever monkeys aren’t bad at!

voiceofokinawaAug. 15 06:33 am JST

Brace for it. What meteorologists call "linear rain band" is moving from western Japan toward the eastern Pacific coast. All the Japanese archipelago is being drenched in torrential rain. Abnormal weather caused by global warming caused by increasing carbon dioxide caused by man's insatiable thirst for comfortable modern way of life seems to be an undeniable fact.

And you don’t live a comfortable way of life typing on your keyboard connected to a computer that less than one half of the world’s population can financially afford or have access to, then going to the refrigerator for something to eat, again something that over half the world’s population is lucky to have. It seems your insatiable thirst for a comfortable modern way of life is adding to the problem. There is a simple solution for this egregious selfishness.

asiafriend,

You are right pointing out our dilemma. You cannot go back to Stone-Age life styles or hand-to-mouth existence any longer. But at least you can question: Is materialism worth pursuing?

300mm of rain in one day is like a river from the sky. Good grief.