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Residents make their way through a flooded street in Hanoi, 03 Nov 2008
The rain began falling Thursday night in Hanoi. And for five days, it did not let up. By Monday, 800 millimeters of rain had fallen on parts of the city in Hanoi's worst flooding in 35 years.
About 20 people have been killed, including three schoolchildren who fell through uncovered storm drains.
There have been power outages across much of the Hanoi. Thousands of cars and motorbikes have been abandoned in chest-high floodwaters, causing massive traffic jams.
But for some, the clouds over Hanoi have a silver lining. Thirty-eight year old taxi driver Do Xuan Kien says the rain had been good for business.
Kien says so many taxis have been abandoned in deep water that the ones that still operate have been doing extra business. His earnings have risen from $40 to $180 a day. But overall, the flooding has paralyzed business.
Nguyen Thi Linh owns a small rice restaurant for office workers. She says the storms have hit her business hard.
Linh says she could not get to the supermarket to buy food for three days, and she has had to close her restaurant.
The floods have put much of the farmland around Hanoi under a meter of water. The government's storm and flood control department says 50,000 hectares of crops have been destroyed.
The price of food at some Hanoi markets has risen as much as 500 percent.
Garage manager Vu Duc Quyen says the city government is at fault for much of the damage for not building better infrastructure.
Quyen says roads in Vietnam are bad and that it takes only a heavy rain to bring traffic to a halt.
Although Hanoi authorities say they are spending some $300 million to improve the city's drainage systems, the city's sewage company says it has just one pumping station to empty the city's rivers and lakes, which now threaten to overflow.
Forecasters predict more rain for Tuesday. And people in Hanoi who live near the city's rivers and lakes have been warned to prepare for major flooding
Matt Steinglass/Hanoi |
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HANOI, Nov. 3 (Xinhua) -- Prolonged heavy rains and floods have claimed 49 lives in northern and central Vietnam by Sunday, Vietnam News reported on Monday, citing sources with the National Steering Committee for Storm and Flood Control.
In Hanoi alone, there have been 18 deaths. The total property damage for the capital city was estimated at 176 million U.S. dollars, the newspaper quoted source with the committee as saying.
According to the Hanoi Water Drainage Company, waters in rivers and lakes in the city are at high levels as the whole city depends on the Yen So pumping station, which has a capacity of 45 cubic meter per second. All 11 pumps at the station are operating at full capacity.
It is estimated the floods and high water levels will have completely receded in Hanoi in the next four to five days, said Nguyen Anh Tu, an official from the drainage company.
More rains will be likely to continue in northern and central provinces during the next few days, according to the National Center for Hydro- Meteorological Forecastin |
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DES MOINES, Iowa, Oct 30, 2008 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Allied Insurance and local independent agents are pleased to announce financial contributions to local nonprofit organizations to help communities recover from the devastating floods that affected Iowa and the Midwest this summer.
Allied Insurance will be hosting two luncheons to present 21 nonprofit organizations with more than $188,000. Members of the media are welcome to attend the luncheons.
-- Friday, October 31, 2008 at Pipac Centre, Ferrari's Ristorante in Cedar Falls, IA from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m.
-- Friday, November 7, 2008 at the Cedar Rapids Museum of Art, Cedar Rapids, IA from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m.
"Allied Insurance and its network of independent agents know that the road to recovery is a long one for Iowans affected by the tornadoes and floods earlier this year," said Anthony Washington, Allied Insurance's Regional Vice President of the Des Moines Regional Office. "Even though the catastrophes happened months ago, we know that help and support is still needed to put communities back together and this is our way of continuing to support those efforts."
Funds will be distributed among nine counties and 14 cities in Eastern Iowa. Of the total donation, Allied Insurance contributed $141,509 and 16 Allied independent insurance agents donated $47,169, for a total donation of $188,678.
The Nationwide Foundation also donated $250,000 during 2008 to assist the American Red Cross in relief efforts to victims of the storms and flooding in Iowa and the Midwest. These donations included a $200,000 grant to the American Red Cross Central U.S. Floods and Tornadoes response (supporting recovery efforts in Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, Oklahoma, West Virginia, and Wisconsin) and a $50,000 grant to the American Red Cross Central Iowa Chapter.
Allied Insurance is a property and casualty insurer established in Des Moines, Iowa, in 1929. Allied operates in 33 states through a network of independent agents with regional offices in Denver, CO; Des Moines, IA; Lincoln, NE; Gainesville, FL; and Sacramento, CA. Allied has been a member of the Nationwide family of companies since 1998, and is responsible for the Nationwide's independent agency system. Nationwide, based in Columbus, Ohio, is a Fortune 500 company and one of the country's largest multi-line insurers and financial services organizations. Information is available at www.alliedinsurance.com.
Nationwide, the Nationwide frame mark, and On Your Side are federally registered service marks of Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company |
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