Greece suffered floods of ‘biblical proportions’

Andreas Klippe Comments February 16, 2018

Another storm of ‘biblical proportions’ has hit the European continent. This time in Greece. Flash floods from Wednesday’s night of severe storm has cut a path of destruction near the Greek capital, killing 16 people and sweeping cars into buildings like rubber toys.

The calamity was the worst to hit the capital in decades and the Greek government has declared a day of national mourning for the victims. The hardest hit was the town of Mandra, a suburb outside the outskirts of Athens. It is estimated about 500 homes and businesses were affected.

Streets were made into raging rivers of mud and debris, washing away cars, destroyed houses and businesses and submerged a portion of a major highway during Wednesday’s night flash floods.

Greece’s General Secretariat for Civil Protection declared the calamity “unprecedented”, whereas Mandra mayor Yianna Kriekouki, called it a “biblical disaster”.

As of Thursday night, among the casualties were a drowned man recovered from his flooded home from nearby Nea Peramos district and four people missing. Most of the missing were reportedly motorists, and search and rescue efforts are underway to find them on the flooded highway.
More storms hit the Greek capital on Thursday, temporarily halting traffic on one of Athens’ main central avenues. Though there were no reported flooding

Drowning seems to be cause of most of the victims recovered from the flooded homes and some were killed by debris from the rushing waters. Calls were made to the fire department to help in pumping water out from flooded homes and businesses since Thursday. The fire department managed to rescue 88 people stranded in houses and vehicles.

Caught unaware

The Greek government was caught unaware with the massive floods. Never in their lifetime have they experienced such intensity. Have they foreseen this, loss of lives could have been prevented. Countermeasures like flood barriers and early warning systems would help alleviate the loss of properties and lives.

As evidenced by the devastation caused by climate change, no country is exempt. Flash floods that happened in Greece will be felt in all nations even in places where severe storms rarely occur. Countries like the Philippines are most vulnerable because of the rising sea levels brought about by climate change. The polar ice caps are melting with the greenhouse gases trapping the heat from the sun.

More deadly storms to come

Disasters like this will start to become more deadly as climate change worsen. This is the bane for the 21st century civilization. Technology has driven mankind to the brink of world wide catastrophes. The industrial age has given way to the calamity age. A century of industrial progress has left the earth with polluting by-products that change the weather patterns of mother nature. With man’s pursuit to make life easier and comfortable we have neglected to take care of our surroundings.

And as a consequence we are reaping its effects. Governments from around world are forced to re-evaluate and revise their disaster plans according to the worst case scenarios. Poor countries are caught unprepared as they do not have the resources to mount a full flood disaster contingencies.

Here to stay

This climate change is here to stay. Some scientists say it will be felt for a hundred years or more, unless we are ready to admit it is our own doing and must change our attitude in regards to the environment. The earth is not a garbage dump where we throw away waste materials. Sooner or later it will come back to us.

Nothing on this earth is forever, all of us will die eventually but the next generations will suffer by the actions we have done. Only we can reverse the damages that was done to the environment. The time to act is now!