Where-Philippines
When-December 27, 2011
This image shows a newlywed couple displaying their rings during their wedding rites as they stand in front of what used to be a church in a village that was destroyed by floods. The city is Iligan City in Mindanao, in the southern part of the Philippines. Over 1453 people died from floods in the south due to the heavy rain that triggered the flooding on the eastern coast. The reason I chose this picture is because of two different things. Even though something terrible had happened to their city, they still were able to celebrate. However, this image also shows how used to floods and typhoons people in Southern Asia are, and that the rising amount of occurrences of these has to be a warning to people.
With information from the World Bank website, I was able to create these graphs to compare my findings and reach an end observation. In this chart of the Philippines, which is a tropical climate, below, you can see that the average rainfall since 1901-2016 has increased a fair bit. The temperature has remained close to the same, while the rainfall amount has increased.
In another chart of Greenland, which has a polar climate, you can see that the temperature has risen by an average of 2 degrees Celsius. While 2 degrees might not be a drastic change, over the next decade one can assume that the temperature will continue to rise. The precipitation has drastically increased, which can be linked back to the warming environment, and is one of the reasons for flooding in countries.
Another source, PAGASA, (Philippine Atmospheric Geophysical and Astronomical Services Association), link flooding to overflowing of lakes and rivers, and can also relate it to the uncontrollable release of impounded water in reservoirs and by the accumulation of excessive runoff water from mountains. The reason there is an abundance of water is because the colder climates are warming up and the melting glaciers are releasing tons of water. The website also goes on to elaborate about the restoration process. It states that emotional and social trauma inflicted on people from the flood has a short term effect of inhibiting the community’s drive to repair the damage done.