Massive floods in Uttarkashi district, many feared dead

Wow, hang in there. Thoughts go out to those in trouble....

That is much more like treating symptons rather then root cause of desease.You mention DLF, o.k. I do not know much of their modus oprendi but what I am sure is they do not like green belts or any kind of tree cover in their concreat jungles wheras Unitech and Huda do care about trees.

[QUOTE=Paleface;1456407]You should be all right with that plan as far as getting up there, and also something more substantial may be up and running at Gangori.

Actually the old bridge that just washed away, was being upgraded with a new bridge, but that fell down a year or so ago due to shoddy engineering - yet its' concrete work is supporting the temporary bridge seen coming up on the same supports.

Whatever disaster aid comes to Uttarkashi area, the people are talking that the work should go to a MNC, and not to local contractor's - i'll support that if it means quality materials and work. The cabinet minister for development is as good a man as they come, so we hope so..

Praise the mule as they keep it all going.
Definitely MNCs will be better. Of course we have to and one wish the workers were as good and hard working as the mules.
Your pics. are really shocking and the suspension bridge where we spent many hours watching the pilgrims and the evening crowd 2 years ago has come to be this. Just cannot believe.

What is also spooky is that Uttarkashi bazaar is deserted, so many can't get in from outlying villages and many have also gone down the hills.

Consensus is that irresponsible dumping of malwa from the small dams construction on Asi has contributed to this disaster.

That may be looking for a scapegoat when several contributing factors lined up.. especially the exceptionally heavy downpour very high up. Even so, more rubble had been dumped in the riverbed/banks on the narrow valley Asi, as well as recent major slides of rock into the river, no doubt a huge amount of water got backed up and burst at three points it seems, as large waves came down in three pulses....and it would have required something like that to shift these huge boulders that were tossed down at sangam of Asi/Bhagi...

It's raining heavily tonight, two hours non-stop so far.

Bravo to 36 Border Roads! They've got the superstructure up for the temporary bridge across Asi at Gangori. Quick work given the circumstances so the picture as far as transportation for further up the valley of Bhagirathi should change very soon.

Citymonk - I was appreciating "one individual" in DLF, not the organisation itself. Agree completely on how brown they have made Gurgaon but then not sure it is only them, I think all builders and HUDA are to blame.

BRO and the BRTF have always been the pride of Indian Army- their efficiency , professionalism and technical prowess are just wonderful. Hats off to those wonderful people.
But the problem is when the civil department takes over; they will not care to find out the root cause of this disaster. Simple cosmetic work will not solve the problem and they will have to approach it with professional technical skill and let us hope that it will be done.
I cnnot just imagine a deserted Uttarkashi. Any idea about the condition of Tapovankuti?

Massive disaster by 3rd August floods has changed the Geography of Uttarkashi City. Whole city is running on the temporary arrangements for the last 18 days.Failure of these arrangements can worsen the situation. Administration please wake up and take the situation seriously and take some concrete steps to reduce peoples problems.

I'm not aware of all the arrangements obviously, that the administration is implementing, or not.

A temporary fix can be dangerous - as proven today. The Tilodh bridge by the GMVN is standing, but the approach was washed away. People wanted to use is asap understandably, so a retaining wall was under construction and a temporary walkway was put up due to the community pressure.

The retaining wall collapsed today as people were working on it and washed them away and also the walkway came down with it. Several lives lost, half a dozen very serious injuries.

The Bhagirathi has shifted course and today was quite high. There are several reasons why the wall could have come down - rainfall, rise in water level of the river, exacerbation upon saturated foundations, and it all contributed to the fall.

Following video explains your sentiments about several reasons.
Hope when this happened in utttarkasi earlier this month, residents had time to escape the fall.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GquiV...eature=related

There's no denying that there are a lot of sub-standard constructions.

Foundations not deep enough, less rebar maybe, concrete columns and beams that are not vibrated so leaving plenty of gaps and so on.. But, the power of the relentless water will take down moreorless everything. Those large pulses of water don't forget have all sorts of debris in them, trees as battering rams, boulders and full of smaller rocks, that all ram, abrase and crumble what is in their path.

That building in the clip was i guess, a good 200 feet from the river, yet the water ate the banks, the fields and eventually its' foundations simply couldn't handle the forces.

We were offered plenty of plots on the bank of Bhagirathi, but no thanks, always preferred to be uphill and well away from a mighty river.

You are blessed ones indeed.
Is way to kedar nath, Gori kund open.

You certainly are fortunate.One thing I believe about the fury of nature is that, when it is really furious nothing can hold that fury and human interventions add to that fury. The only thing is that technically good constructions can hold on in ordinary situations. When the whole bank is being washed away, where is the chance of survival even for well built ones. In flash floods even in USA where technology is so developed the damages caused are astounding. What could we do about the Tsunami! So everything said, we have to accept the fact that the power of nature is much more than any human technology can handle.

The Tilodh bridge incident has been reported by media etc as two deaths, whereas it is nine at least as the whole incident was observed by sadhu's living next to there - who counted nine bodies taken by Bhagirathi. What's the point in any misreporting?

It is true that a JCB touched/smacked the temporary bridge and toppled it while working on filling in the gap with rocks. That there were people on the bridge at the time begs the question whether it was safe to cross or not as work is proceeding? We all know how impatient folks are to get thru the gap first!

Sadly one of the dead is an 18 yr old, the nephew of Bagat ji, friend and our milkman, from Pata gaon, just along the way here. We knew the boy, and he had a peon job at the excellent Catholic run school in Uttarkashi. He was on the way to work.

Who knows if pressure to cross or a momentary mistake by the JCB operator caused this awful incident. Bagat ji and a large group of men have gone off toward Chinyalisur to search for bodies as the gates of the Uttarkashi dam were open at the time. At Chinyalisur and because of the Tehri dam the waters of the river spread out and are calmed form that point.

Very sad indeed.

Chances are the body of the lad may never be recovered.

Photo story here at Amarujala in case you haven't seen.

http://www.amarujala.com/photo-featu...kashi-213.aspx