Tag: Rain

Kongjian Yu Has a Plan for Urban Flooding: ‘Sponge Cities’

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Cities around the world face a daunting challenge in the era of climate change: Supercharged rainstorms are turning streets into rivers, flooding subway systems and inundating residential neighborhoods, often with deadly consequences. Kongjian Yu, a landscape architect and professor at Peking University, is developing what might seem like a counterintuitive response: Let the water in. “You cannot fight water,” he said. “You have to adapt to it.” Instead of putting in more drainage pipes, building flood walls and channeling rivers between concrete embankments, which is the usual approach to managing…

Storms Deluge Hong Kong and Southern Chinese Cities

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Torrential rains have pounded southern China, flooding low-lying homes and roads, choking expressways, and prompting officials to suspend classes while the record-breaking storms lingered over the region. By Friday morning, Shenzhen, a southern Chinese commercial city next to Hong Kong, had endured nearly eight inches of rain overnight, in the most intense downpour since records began in 1952, according to the city’s official news service. Hong Kong was hit by about six inches of rainfall in several hours. The Hong Kong Observatory headquarters recorded over six inches in just one…

Anger in China Over Flooding of Towns, in Part, to Save Beijing

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For days, the rain came down in sheets, pounding Beijing and areas around it in what the government said was the heaviest deluge China’s capital had seen since record keeping began 140 years ago. When the extreme downpour finally stopped on Tuesday, most of Beijing had been spared the worst — but partly because officials made sure the floodwaters went elsewhere. Officials in Hebei Province, which borders Beijing, had opened flood gates and spillways in seven low-lying flood control zones to prevent rivers and reservoirs from overflowing in Beijing and…

Typhoon Khanun Threatens Japan and China on Heels of Doksuri

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A powerful tropical cyclone was approaching islands in southern Japan on Tuesday, days after another one slammed into mainland China and the Philippines and left dozens of people dead or injured across the region. The new storm, Typhoon Khanun, was less than 200 miles southeast of a major United States military base in southern Japan’s Okinawa Prefecture on Tuesday, according to the United States military’s Joint Typhoon Warning Center in Hawaii. Khanun was producing maximum sustained winds of 138 miles per hour, making it the equivalent of a Category 4…

At Least 2 Dead in Heavy Rains and Flooding in Beijing

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Fierce rain and flooding pummeled Beijing on Monday, killing at least two people as the downpour triggered landslides and swept away cars on the city’s outskirts after the authorities issued a red alert for what they warned was the heaviest deluge in years. The intense rain since the weekend prompted Beijing to close tourist attractions like the ancient Forbidden City. But the worst effects have been felt in the city’s outer districts, where downpours overwhelmed riverbeds that usually stay dry for much of the year. By Monday afternoon, the Beijing…

Typhoon Doksuri Grazes the Philippines on Its Way to China

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Typhoon Doksuri, a tropical cyclone moving through the Pacific Ocean, grazed the northern Philippines on Wednesday morning and was expected to pass near Taiwan before making landfall in China later this week. As of early Wednesday morning local time, the storm was over Fuga Island in the Philippines’ Cagayan Province, the national meteorological service said in a bulletin. The agency had warned that flooding and rain-induced landslides were possible over the next three days, and urged people in some low-lying areas to evacuate. It was not immediately clear if the…

Typhoon Doksuri Heads for Philippines, Taiwan and Southern China

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Typhoon Doksuri, a tropical cyclone moving through the Pacific Ocean with wind speeds equivalent to that of a Category 4 hurricane, was forecast to potentially hit the northern Philippines on Tuesday before passing near Taiwan and making landfall in China later this week. As of late Tuesday morning, the storm was about 167 miles east of Tuguegarao City, near the east coast of Luzon, the country’s largest and most populous island, the Philippine national meteorological service said in a bulletin. The agency warned that flooding and rain-induced landslides were possible…

China Reels From Floods and a Bruising Heat Wave

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China and several other Asia Pacific countries were reeling from monsoonal floods and stultifying temperatures on Wednesday, the latest disruptions in what forecasters say could be a long summer and autumn of extreme weather around the world. The authorities in China said on Wednesday that 15 people had died and four others were missing as a result of flooding in the sprawling southwestern city of Chongqing, according to the state-run news media. In another sign of how bad the flooding was in China, news footage showed rescuers in the central…

Turning Cities Into Sponges to Save Lives and Property

Chin@Strategy

Imagine a sponge. Swipe it over a wet surface and it will draw up water; squeeze it and the water will trickle out. Now imagine a city made of sponges, or spongelike surfaces, able to soak up rainwater, overflowing rivers or ocean storm surges and release stored water during droughts. Engineers, architects, urban planners and officials around the world are seeking ways to retrofit or reconstruct cities to better deal with water — basically, to act more like sponges. While water management has always been an essential service in cities,…