Pakistan’s largest city is damaged by nonstop rain. Climate disaster makes weather more unpredictable. Heavy rains during the monsoon season flooded Karachi streets. Public services in Pakistan’s largest city, Karachi, have been suspended and businesses are being urged to close, as torrential rains cause deadly flash flooding and infrastructure damage, leaving at least 18 dead since Saturday. On Sunday night, more than 60 millimeters (2.3 inches) of rain fell in Karachi, equivalent to an entire months’ worth of rainfall in just a matter of hours. For several months every summer, Pakistan struggles to contend with heavy monsoon rains, but in recent years experts say climate change is accelerating existing weather patterns. Pakistan government issued flash flood warnings for residents in more than 14 cities and townships. Since the monsoon season began last month, more than 300 people have been killed by heavy rains across Pakistan. In Karachi, capital of Sindh province and home to about 20 million, entire neighborhoods have been partially submerged. People are wading knee-deep in muddy floodwater, with vehicles left grounded by the flood. Infrastructures including bridges, highways and roads have been destroyed, disturbing traffic and harming the lives of millions across the city. Many have kept up fuel for their generators in case of power failures.
Climate change is a menace. . It’s happening so fast and Karachi being the coastal city tolerates the stress. People see the situation beyond individual events like a bridge falling or a road getting flooded. People drive across a flooded street after heavy rainfall in Lahore. There is the climate crisis and poor infrastructure. Pakistan usually experiences heavy rains from July through September, but climate expert says say the rains have only increased in both frequency and severity. The poorest and most exposed are facing crisis. About 50 percent of its residents are forced to live in unofficial settlements, according to the World Bank. Karachi’s infrastructure is highly exposed to climate-related disasters, according to the World Bank. The trouble is worsened by poor flood management and ineffective disaster response, other provinces, including Balochistan in the southwest, have also experienced extreme rainfall in recent days. At least 87 people have been killed in the province due to “heavy rainfall, floods and infrastructure collapse in this month alone. At least eight dams in Balochistan have been broken while nine bridges have been damaged; the PDMA survey report said that more than 700 livestock have died due to flooding. Karachi’s main streets, which house financial institutions and bank headquarters including Pakistan’s central bank, were flooded and rescue services were using boats to reach grounded people. Laborers carry produce as they go through a flooded road after heavy rainfall, in Lahore. Extreme weather affects millions. These sorts of weather events in South Asia are becoming increasingly frequent due to climate change, with temperatures in parts of India and Pakistan reaching record levels during a heat wave in April and May. A deadly cholera outbreak linked to contaminated drinking water had infected thousands of people in central Pakistan in May, as the country fight with a water crisis aggravated by the very high temperatures. Pakistan hit by deadly cholera outbreak as heat wave grips South Asia. Pakistan is hit by deadly cholera outbreak as heat wave spreads South Asia. Residents in Pir Koh, a remote mountainous town in Balochistan province, had no access to clean drinking water. The lack of rain had caused nearby ponds to dry up, with their only source of water being a pipeline that had rusted and contaminated the water supply, said local resident Hassan Bugti. A 2022 report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change said they had medium confidence that heat waves and humidity stress would become more intense and frequent, and annual and summer monsoon storm will increase. India and Pakistan are among the countries anticipated to be worst affected by the climate crisis.
The 2022 monsoon season has been phenomenally troublesome for Pakistan would be an understatement. The continuous wet weather has disparaged the country, causing damage on infrastructure in rural areas as well as the cities. The 30-year average for rainfall in Sindh and Balochistan had been broken. With the latest weather system heavy rainfall in both the provinces, another record may well be broken.
According to NDMA figures, over 300 people have died in rain-related incidents, with Balochistan reporting the highest deaths. Destruction of property has also been significant, as around 9,000 houses have partially or completely been damaged. Sindh’s urban areas still staggering from earlier rain spells were again hit by heavy storm that started early Sunday morning and continued till Monday. The high volume of rainfall has resulted in usual misery: flooded roads, deaths due to electrocution, electricity breakdowns and the paralysis of normal life. So were the problems caused by heavy rainfall that the Sindh government declared a holiday in Karachi and Hyderabad on Monday. In these context weather events likely to become the norm due to climate change, a contingency plan is essential to save lives and lessen damage to property and infrastructure.
Major drains were cleaned in Karachi after the anger that was raised following the 2020 monsoon disaster; clearly the problem requires a thorough analysis to arrive at practical solutions. For rural areas, early warning systems should be in place that can enable swift evacuation of exposed populations in case of flash floods or hill torrents. In the cities, where drainage systems have collapsed and the cemented jungle has choked natural rainwater run-off channels, a satisfactory plan of action needs to be applied to prevent urban flooding. Several suggestions those offered by the multinational C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group, of which Karachi is a member. Creating spaces that can store rainwater. Bangkok, for example, has created a park that can store millions of gallons of water. If Pakistan is to frequently deal with the nonstop threat of heavy rainfall, planning and implementation of such steps is required. A petition has been filed to reopen a two-year-old case related to impartial investigation into poor management during monsoon rains. The petition said that citizens have suffered losses worth millions of rupees. The government representatives are just reporting that everything is good through the media. Two years ago the Supreme Court that works was told that various projects will begin with the federal government at a cost of Rs1, 100 billion. However, no project could be started. Therefore, it is requested to thoroughly investigate the rain disaster in Karachi.
