Our Correspondent
Imphal, July 12 (EMN): Climate experts have linked the tragic landslides in Manipur’s Tamenglong district headquarters, which claimed the lives of nine persons and leaving five injured, to climate change by triggering high intensity of rainfall in short duration.
High intensity rain at the scale of 158.8 mm lashed Tamenglong district headquarters for five hours from July 11 midnight, says nodal officer Dr. T Brajakumar of the state climate cell of environment directorate. The rain was quite heavy that it recorded 44.2 litres of rainwater over a square metre at that particular period of the disaster (2-3 am of July 11).
The rainfall was treated as very high intensity, says Brajakumar, who has been monitoring the state climate data since the few decades. The heavy rain in short duration with high intensity might also one of the reasons for landslides occurred at New Salem, Tamenglong, and Ward No. 4 at around 3 am on July 11.
A state government employee, who had been staying in the Tamenglong district headquarters which is about 150 km west of Imphal for quite some, felt that Wednesday’s rain was one of the heaviest rainfalls ever in the district.
Echoing a similar feeling, a resident of ward No.4 also informed that there was a similar incident around a decade back where two persons lost their lives when a wall collapsed following heavy rain at the ward No.5 of the hill town.
The heavy rain on July 11 also submerged a large area of paddy fields in Noney area, reports added.
Tamenglong like situation had occurred in Senapati after the district received a large amount of rain (40.8mm) within one hour on August 26, 2017. On April 5, 2017, four houses and one local playground were damaged by a massive landslide at Sirarakhong village following intense rain in Ukhrul district.
Interestingly, Imphal also has been receiving high rainfall since 1956, recording 2,439.4 mm in 2017 till December 13 or 68.71% above the state’s annual precipitation of 1446.3 mm, Indian Council of Agricultural Research’s (ICAR) Imphal centre has stated in a press release issued on December 13 last year.
Rainfall above 2,000 mm was recorded only in 1991 (2,110.6 mm) and in 1993 (2,171.6 mm), it added. Rain in January, February and November in the current year was below normal with 70.8%, 52.3% and 79.5% recorded respectively.
In 2017, the highest rainfall was recorded on March 31 (103.4mm) and highest monthly record in December with 116.3 mm of rains till December 13.
