SUMATERA: Gempa bumi magnitud 6 dilaporkan melanda Sumatera Utara, Indonesia lewat semalam, mengakibatkan gegaran dirasai sehingga Pulau Pinang, di Malaysia, sejauh kira-kira 500 kilometer (km).

Beberapa penduduk pangsapuri di Pulau Tikus, Jalan Masjid Kapitan Keling dan Tanjung Bungah, melaporkan terasa gegaran selama kira-kira 20 saat.

Gegaran itu dilaporkan Pusat Penyelidikan Geosains Jerman (GFZ) yang menyatakan gempa berlaku pada kedalaman 89km.

Sementara itu, menurut hantaran di laman Facebook Jabatan Meteorologi Malaysia, gempa bumi berkenaan berlaku pada kedalaman 74km dengan pusat gempa terletak kira-kira 107km ke tenggara Meulaboh di wilayah Aceh.

Tiada ancaman tsunami dikesan susulan gempa itu. Sementara itu pihak berkuasa di Beijing, China melaporkan satu gempa bumi magnitud 5.5 melanda Tibet awal pagi tadi.

Menurut Pentadbiran Gempa Bumi China (CEA) gegaran berlaku berlaku di bandar Shigatse pada jam 5:11 pagi (2111 GMT), pada kedalaman 10km.

Pihak berkuasa sudah menghantar pasukan tindak balas kecemasan dan setakat ini tiada kemalangan jiwa dilaporkan. Pada Januari lalu, lebih 120 orang terkorban akibat gempa bumi magnitud 6.8 yang melanda daerah Tingri, Tibet, kira-kira 240 km dari Shigatse.

GFZ juga melaporkan satu gempa bumi magnitud 5.7 turut menggegarkan Kepulauan Vanuatu. - AGENSI

PETALING JAYA: Thunderstorms, heavy rain and strong winds are expected in parts of Peninsular Malaysia, Sabah and Sarawak until 5pm on Monday (May 12).

The Meteorology Malaysia Department (MetMalaysia) issued a warning at 2:25pm of thunderstorms, heavy rain and strong winds in Perlis, Kedah (Langkawi, Kubang Pasu, Padang Terap, Sik, Baling, Kulim and Bandar Baru), Penang (North Seberang Perai, Central Seberang Perai and South Seberang Perai), Perak, Kelantan (Jeli), Terengganu (Dungun and Kemaman), Pahang (Cameron Highlands, Lipis, Jerantut and Rompin), Selangor (Sabak Bernam, Kuala Selangor, Hulu Selangor, Gombak and Hulu Langat), Kuala Lumpur, Negri Sembilan (Jelebu, Kuala Pilah and Jempol), Johor (Segamat, Muar, Kluang, Mersing and Kota Tinggi).

A RECENTLY constructed flood retention pond at Taman Teluk Pulai, in Klang, Selangor is causing frustration among residents who say it has failed to serve its intended purpose.

The pond located at Lorong Serampang 1 has not providng much-needed flood mitigation, they say.

The residents said hoarding around the premises was removed at the end of March. They questioned the retention pond’s efficacy, describing it as a “sunken field”.

Despite the existence of a retention pond in the neighbourhood, a flood occurred two weeks ago leaving homes water­logged after 20 minutes of rain.

Ampika Pathy, 80, said floods in the area, before MBDK turned the land into a retention pond, were not as severe.

“We noticed that the recent floods were worse because water overflowed onto the main road. “Traffic was chaotic and motorists driving down from Teluk Pulai overhead bridge had to make a U-turn,” he said.

Along Jalan Teluk Pulai, Star Metro noticed a signboard stating that the reservoir was to meet urban storm water management needs. It also said: “During heavy rains, this area will hold water before it is slowly released to prevent flooding in downstream areas. 

“The water level will rise and fall slowly, so you are advised to leave this area when it rains heavily. “This area can be used for recreation during dry weather.”

Residents said when dry, the sunken field turned into a rubbish dump. S. Guna­rasa, 80, said there were two outlets for water to flow into the monsoon drains but this was not happening and that his house in Lorong Sepat 3 got flooded.

He added that he had lodged multiple complaints with MBDK. “There are overgrown plants in the drains, which have not been cleaned in months.

“The soil and silt must be removed.” Lee Siew Guat, 70, who has been living next to the retention pond for three years, said she was shocked to see how the area was inundated with water.

“My neighbours who have been here for the last 40 years have also never seen such bad flooding.” Teluk Pulai Residents Asso­ciation chairman Santokh Singh questioned the rationale and mechanism used by MBDK when the retention pond was planned.

“There was no feasibility study. The monsoon drains surrounding the neighbourhood have not been cleaned, which is also the cause for the flooding,” he said. R. Ramachandran, 75, who lives behind the Teluk Pulai KTM Komuter station, said he had to place a stone slab at the entrance of his house to keep floodwaters out.

“It has worsened in the last 10 years,” he said, adding that poor drainage around the station carpark contributed to the problem. MBDK did not reply to Star­Metro’s request for feedback at press time.

LEICESTER, May 12 — In a stream near Leicester in central England, six volunteers in waterproof overalls and boots busily reinforced mini wooden structures designed to combat the rising flooding threat.

The city, like many others in the UK, has experienced several intense rainfall events in recent years, which have caused significant damage.

Alert to climate change, which intensifies these events, authorities are strengthening their defences and turning to solutions more sympathetic with the environment.

With their feet firmly planted on the bed of the Saffron Brook, a tributary of the River Soar that runs through Leicester, the volunteers ensured the structures’ wooden bundles were securely anchored.

These structures create bends that “change the behaviour of the river” and slow down water in stretches where it currently flows “straight and very fast,” said Dan Scott, who leads the programme at the Trent Rivers Trust, a local group working to protect rivers.

He regularly oversees the installation of new facilities. A few months ago, the trust dug a pond on a river near the town of Loughborough and installed dozens of leaky wooden barriers to better protect downstream houses that flooded in the past.

These techniques are “complementary to traditional flood defences” such as retention basins and canals that are increasingly under strain, Scott said.

They “help to store some of that water upstream so that those traditional flood defences don’t get overwhelmed, and if they do, it’s not as quickly as if these features weren’t in place,” he added. They also help to maintain biodiversity.

‘Urgent problem’

More than 6.3 million properties are at risk of flooding in the UK, and this figure will rise to more than eight million by 2050, according to a recent government report.

“Flooding is a really urgent societal problem,” said Steven Forest, director of the Flood Risk Management Program at the University of Hull.

Climate events resulted in UK insurance payouts of more than £400 million (RM2.27 billion) in 2022 and more than £570 million in 2023 and 2024, half of which was related to flooding, according to the Association of British Insurers.

Beyond traditional defences, “we need to think about living with water, and we need to think about integrating water within our urban spaces,” Forest added.

He cited the Netherlands, which allocates space for rivers to drain during heavy rainfall, and the United States, where vegetation “buffer zones” were created after Hurricane Sandy in 2012.

“Straight-jacketing” waterways with various infrastructure is no longer sufficient, Forest said, especially since seven percent of such structures were assessed to be in “poor” or “very poor” condition by the UK Environment Agency in 2022.

Overcoming scepticism

But convincing residents and authorities is not always an easy task as it often needs explaining that “just because we’ve not built a concrete solution, that it isn’t going to be as effective,” Scott said.

“It’s also about re-educating people in government because it’s easier for them to sell something (to voters) that’s physical and much more prominent within the landscape,” he added.

Traditional developments attracted the lion’s share of the £2.6 billion announced by the government in March to fund new flood defence systems over the next two years.

But Scott noted a greater interest in natural flood management over the past five years, with the previous government launching a £25 million programme last year.

As a result, Leicester will be able to develop several waterways southeast of the city, and 35 other projects have been selected in England.

“It is encouraging that our successful approach to natural flood management measures is continuing to be supported,” Geoff Whittle, a local councillor responsible for the environment, told AFP.

Contemplating the fruits of her labour in Saffron, 50-year-old volunteer Lis Gibbs told AFP that “it feels like you can make a difference,” in contrast to climate change in general, which “can feel really overwhelming”. — AFP