Cyclone damaged Myanmar "rice bowl"

[phantom power]

The cyclone struck just as the region's paddy farmers were harvesting the dry-season crop, which accounts for a fourth of the country's annual production.

The tidal surge sent seawater as far as 35 miles inland, satellite photos show, depositing salt that could make paddy land infertile.

Sean Turnell, an expert on Myanmar at Australia's Macquarie University and editor of Burma Economic Watch, said the region's long-neglected, colonial-era irrigation systems probably took a heavy blow as well.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2004399818_cyclone08.html

[lapfog_1]

1. The satellite photos are just amazing...

A huge area of the Irrawaddy delta region simply disappeared.

6 million people lived there, not including the population of Yangon (another 6 million).

It's all under water... still... maybe permanently.

The death toll is going to be a lot more than 100K (once you add in starvation and disease).

[phantom power]

2. This is shaping up to be a huge disaster.

You're right, the ultimate death toll is going to be much worse. Is anybody getting aid in there yet?

[lapfog_1]

4. Feed the children announced that they delivered 40 tons of rice

today.

That's enough to give 1.2M people 1 ounce of rice 1 time.

Not enough, not nearly enough.

My guess is that there are probably 8 to 10 Million people that need help.

They are going to need clean water (20 oz a day minimum), 10 ounces of rice per day, and 6 ounces of protein a day... and that is only emergency rations.

[uppityperson]

3. 5,000 sq km of Myanmar still underwater--UN

http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/breakingnews/world/view/20080508-135368/5000-sq-km-of-Myanmar-still-underwater--UN
Agence France-Presse
First Posted 14:08:00 05/08/2008

BANGKOK -- About 5,000 square kilometers (1,930 square miles) of Myanmar's cyclone-hit regions remain underwater, with more than a million people in need of emergency relief, a UN spokesman said Thursday.

"We're talking about 5,000 square kilometers under water," said Richard Horsey, a Bangkok-based spokesman with the United Nation's Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

"The bottle neck is getting it out in the delta. That needs boats, helicopters, trucks .... there are upward of one million people in need of help," he added.

[Dead_Parrot]

5. No shit

That's like saying some ice damaged the Titanic.