Chitwan National
Park is the first national park in Nepal, established in 1973 and granted the
status of a World Heritage Site in 1984. It covers an area of 932 km2 (360 sq
mi) and is located in the subtropical Inner Terai lowlands of south-central
Nepal in the districts of Nawalparasi, Parsa, Chitwan and Makwanpur. In
altitude it ranges from about 100 m (330 ft) in the river valleys to 815 m (2,674
ft) in the Churia Hills.
Floods in Nepal ~
Guardian photo
Floods are among
Earth's most common–and most destructive–natural hazards. The destruction that
waters can bring is well known to Chennaites though there are no perennial
rivers and no overflow of rain water in Chennai ! ~ there are in face only a few places on Earth where people need not be
concerned about flooding. Any place where rain falls is vulnerable, although
rain is not the only impetus for flood.
Flooding is an overflowing of water onto land that is normally dry.
Floods can happen during heavy rains, when ocean waves come on shore, when snow
melts too fast, or when dams or levees break. Flooding may happen with only a
few inches of water, or it may cover a house to the rooftop. They can occur
quickly or over a long period and may last days, weeks, or longer. Floods are the most common and widespread of all
weather-related natural disasters.
Flash floods are
the most dangerous kind of floods, because they combine the destructive power
of a flood with incredible speed and unpredictability. Flash floods occur when
excessive water fills normally dry creeks or river beds along with currently
flowing creeks and rivers, causing rapid rises of water in a short amount of
time. They can happen with little or no warning.
Disaster experts
classify floods according to their likelihood of occurring in a given time
period. A hundred-year flood, for example, is an extremely large, destructive
event that would theoretically be expected to happen only once every century.
But this is a theoretical number. In reality, this classification means there
is a one-percent chance that such a flood could happen in any given year. Over
recent decades, possibly due to global climate change, hundred-year floods have
been occurring worldwide with frightening regularity.
On the Himalayas in
the beautiful kingdom of Nepal, devastating floods have caused havoc. It has killed 120 people and displaced tens of
thousands and have also destroyed the
habitat of wild animals and swept away several endangered one-horned rhinos to
India.Officials at Chitwan National Park, especially famous as the habitat of
the Royal Bengal Tiger, one-horned rhinos and elephants, are preparing to bring
back the endangered animals that were swept away to different places within
Nepal and to India.
According to
Nepal’s national news agency RSS, authorities have been searching for the missing
rhinos for the past two days. One was found dead while a two-year-old rhino was
detected in an Indian settlement and four more in jungles along the Nepal-India
border.Chitwan National Park’s information officer, Nurendra Aryal, was quoted
as saying that Nepalese authorities had located a two-year-old baby rhino at
Bagaha, 42 km southeast of Balmiki Nagar in India, and were in touch with
Indian officials to bring it back.
An endangered one-horned rhino which was swept
across the Nepalese border into India by flooding has been rescued and brought
home.The young female rhino was found 42km (26 miles) from the Chitwan National
Park in the Indian village of Bagah.Nepal's Chitwan Valley - home to the park
which houses more than 600 rhinos - has been badly affected. Last week dozens
of elephants and rafts were deployed to rescue nearly 500 people trapped in the
area.
Of the fortunate
survivor found miles away in India, a team of 40 Nepali officials were deployed
to bring the two-and-a-half year old rhino home from India.However, officials had
to face difficulties in bringing back
the animals from India as the highway on the Nepalese side has been cut off by
flood waters."We were able to bring the baby rhino back with the support
of Indian forestry officials," the park's Deputy Warden Nurendra Aryal
told BBC Nepali.The rhino, found at a sugarcane farm in an Indian village, was
tranquilised using a dart and brought back in a truck, he said.
Of the rhinos still
missing, officials say two are inside the protected tiger conservation area in
Valmikinagar in India, which borders the Chitwan district.Two others are in
sugarcane fields in the nearby Nepali district of Nawalparsai. Another
two-year-old rhino was found dead. Mr Aryal said that the two rhinos in India
would be rescued after the flooding subsided.
The monsoon season,
which starts in June and ends in September, causes floods across the region
each year.In India's Assam state, six rhinos are reported to have drowned after
monsoon flooding at the Kaziranga National Park.
With regards – S.
Sampathkumar
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