Uttarakhand disaster 2013: Lessons learnt

Uttarakhand, one of the hill states of Northern India, was severely hit by heavy rain induced flash floods and landslides in the 3rd week of June, 2013. This abnormally high amount of rainfall has been attributed to the fusion of Westerlies with the Indian monsoonal cloud system (Fig. 3). This has resulted into huge loss to lives and properties and specially disrupting the peak seasonal activities to Char Dham Pilgrimmage. The melting of Chorabari Glacier and eruption of the Mandakini River has led to floods near Kedarnath Shrine area, Rambara, Agostyamuni, Tilwara, Guptkashi in Rudraprayag district. There were torrential rainfall in Himachal Pradesh and Western Nepal, and in other nearby regions of Delhi, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and some parts of Tibet. Pilgrimage centres in the region, including Gangotri, Yamunotri, Kedarnath and Badrinath, are visited by thousands of devotees, especially during May to September. Over a lakh people were stuck in various regions because of damaged roads, landslides and flash flood induced debris. People in other important locations such as the Valley of Flowers, Roopkund and the Sikh Pilgrimage Centre Hemkund were stranded for days together.

The scale and magnitude of the extreme event was such that more than 580 persons are confirmed to have lost their lives. Besides, another 5,474 persons who are still missing and presumed to be dead. The disaster was of “unprecedented magnitude”. Many from political and social/religious/philanthropic organizations were also involved in the rescue and management of relief centres. The national highways and other important roads were closed to regular traffic. Helicopters and various modes of other transports were used to rescue people, but due to the rough terrain, heavy fog and rainfall, maneuvering them was a challenge. More than one lakh pilgrims, tourists and 40-50 thousand locals trapped in the terrains were rescued to safe places in the shortest possible time, notwithstanding widespread destruction of roads, difficult terrain and
extremely hostile weather. In the massive response operation “Surya Hope”, the IAF rescued 23,775 persons, the Army 38,750 and the ITBP 33,000 and NDRF 9,000 from the affected areas. IAF dropped 730MT of essential commodities at different places. Civil aviation helicopters airlifted 13,000 pilgrims/local people to safer places. Other state govt. agencies such as police department, district authorities, NGOs and volunteers also helped in the rescue and relief operations. The major part of the evacuation was  accomplished in less than a fortnight making it one of the largest, swiftest and safest rescue/evacuation operation. On June 25, one Indian Air Force (Mi-17V5) rescue helicopters returning from Kedarnath, carrying 5 Air Force, 9 NDRF, and 6 ITBP officers crashed on a mountainous slope near Gauri Kund, killing all aboard. Uttarakhand suffered several major disasters in the past including:

• Bursting of Gohna Tal in 1894
• Alaknanda Floods in 1970
• Bhagirathi Floods in 1978
• Uttarkashi earthquake in 1991
• Malpa and Ukhimath landslides in 1998
• Chamoli earthquake in 1999
• Budhakedar and Phata landslide in 2001
• Varunavat landslide in 2003
• Munsiyari landslide in 2009
• Kapkot landslide in 2010
• Asiganga and Bhagirathi flashflood in 2012 and
• The recent flash floods in Alaknanda, Mandakini and Bhagirathi valleys in June 2013.

It is true that the state is located in the midst of young and unstable mountains. It is also true that the area is subject to intense rainfall but neither of these characteristics observed for the last so many decades could be termed as calamity of this nature. The regular tragedies around the monsoon has been occurring in the hill state of India, which are mainly due to landslides and debris flow, but too many devastations are the result of deft attention being paid to the technology of stabilization of roads and construction of road/riverside establishments. The situation in Uttarakhand reveals not only shocking tale of vulnerable establishments but also exposed sheer nonsense of unpreparedness, be it in the form of early warning of “cloud burst” or uncontrolled development along the vulnerable terrains.

The objective of the workshop was:

• To share the experiences of all organisations direc tly and indirectly involved with the massive relief and rescue works
• To synthesize early warning related information and reasoning by various experts on the country’s predicaments in “cloud burst” forecas ting
• To accumulate information for the development of a national document
• To suggest strategies for short, medium and long te rm recovery, rehabilitation and reconstruction.