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Sunday, November 22, 2009

Edition2: November Rains


Unpredicted weather is order of the day. Have you heard of heavy rains in November? You mush have only heard the popular Guns and Roses Number.

Pune experienced heavy rains with strong winds Last Tuesday and Wednesday. Many trees and poles were uprooted creating traffic and electricity problems.

Four people were killed and 44 fishermen who had ventured into the sea were missing after Cyclone Phyan hit the Maharashtra coast on

Last Wednesday morning. The cyclone, however, spared Mumbai and the Gujarat coast. Packing windspeeds of up to 75kmph, the cyclone hit three districts on the Maharashtra coast — Sindhudurg, Ratnagiri and Raigad. Officials said 1,000 houses suffered damages. The Coast Guard and the Navy saved 24 people in rescue operations.

Cyclone Phyan, which was named by Myanmar under World Meteorological Organisation's practice of countries naming cyclones (Phyan in Burmese means a cherry fallen off a tree). Mumbai started experiencing rains and high winds since Tuesday afternoon

But the cyclone had lost much of its bite. It barely scraped by the city's coastline. Phyan crossed the coast between Mumbai and Alibag, to south of the city, between 3.30pm and 4.30pm, IMD said. Wednesday morning saw heavy rains lash the city. "Instead of moving toward Gujarat, it changed its course to Rajasthan in evening. By then it had dissipated,

By Wednesday afternoon, IMD told state government that the cyclone had disappeared

Is climate change behind cyclone Phyan?It seems almost prophetic what the UN panel on climate change had warned in 2007. Mumbai and Kolkata will face the maximum brunt of the climate change. That's what the report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change said. Mumbai, it said, is particularly vulnerable. "Since Mumbai has reclaimed ocean land substantially, they are going to have a tough time. Though the average rainfall would reduce, yet flash rains will be the major cause of worry for urban populace in Mumbai."Just this year cyclone Aila killed more than 120 people and left 5 lakh homeless in coastal west Bengal. Kolkata saw a deluge.

Time for everyone to act and reduce global warming. We have last chance..

The European Union (EU)'s environment chief had announce in February 09 conference, that Copenhagen conference scheduled to take place at the end of this year, was the cornerstone in the fight against global warming. He cautioned that, if important steps aren't taken to address this issue at the next global summit, then the world could miss its only opportunity to start tackling the problem before it's too late. The UN meeting, which will most likely take place in December, has to conclude with better results than the previous one, held in Potsdam, Poland, last December.By 2012, the Kyoto Protocol, which currently regulates the amounts of carbon dioxide that are emitted into the atmosphere, as well as the maximum allowed limits of other greenhouse gases, will come to an end, and politicians will need to have another treaty completed by that time.
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The meeting in Copenhagen is aimed at resolving just that issue, by providing the 190 states attending it with another international legal framework. Should it get adopted this year, starting with 2013, the new treaty will go into full effect, basically replacing all the rights and obligations of the Kyoto agreement, which was signed in 1997 in Japan.

Firstly, that our partners in the industrialized world commit to comparable cuts, secondly, that developing countries agree to take action in line with their capabilities. The Copenhagen agreement will have to involve a major scaling up of financial aid to help developing countries to both mitigate emissions and adapt to climate change.

This expecations have to involve both already industrialized world who have mainly abused the environment and developing countries who plan to grow and as well have onus to save earth. Really need some effective solution else we will end up in November rain or January summer….

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