| This
is the sequence of events leading up to the current disaster in
Mozambique
12 Mar -
The level of the Zambezi river is stable. The road to Caia, the
base for relief work in the valley, is effectively open again.
11 Mar - The Zambezi River Authority ignores
Mozambican appeals to close one of the three floodgates on the Kariba
dam in order to lessen the volume of water flowing into
flood-stricken Mozambique
9 Mar - Mozambique radio says that the
Cahora Bassa dam is already filled to capacity because of upstream
flooding. It says that authorities have opened a fifth sluice gate and
aree considering opening a sixth which could see the level of the
Zambezi rise higher resulting in more damage
8 Mar - Mozambique: "A
country just few inches away from a major humanitarian tragedy" -
With these words Ross Mountain, UN
Assistant Emergency Relief Coordinator, describes the situation in
Mozambique where floods have already displaced 80,000 people, claimed
the lives of 52, and are currently threatening another 50,000.
8 Mar - The
principal road linking the port of Beira to the capital Maputo, to
Zimbabwe and to Malawi again closed due to flooding on the Pungwe
River.
7 Mar - A
cyclone threatening to exacerbate flooding in Mozambique is reduced to a
tropical depression and might weaken further by the weekend when it is
expected to make landfall.
5 Mar - The
Italian minister for foreign affairs, Lamberto Dini, gives
orders for a team of experts, headed by the Deputy Director General for
Development Cooperation, Massimo Iannucci, to go to Mozambique, in order
to address the new emergency.
24 Feb - The Cahora Bassa dam increases its
release of excess water by 40% aggravating flooding throughout the
Zambezi River Valley. Despite this increase, the Cahora Bassa is now at
maximum capacity and receiving inflows that exceed releases.
21 Feb 2001 - Mozambican government
declares a flood emergency and appeals to the international community
for $30 million in emergency assistance.
8 to 14 Feb 2001 - Mozambique's
National Meteorological Institute reports heavy rain in the centre of
the country. The heaviest rain fell on Tete province (305.7 mm in Tete
city), followed by Manica (112.22 mm in Chimoio), Zambezia (85.4
mm in Quelimane) and Sofala (64.2 mm in Beira) provinces.
3 Jan 2001 - The Zambezi River bursts its
banks flooding farmland in the north-western province of Tete, while the
Cahora Bassa dam in Tete province stores enough water to prevent
flooding further downstream
2 Jan 2001 - Mozambican authorities warn
that more than 150,000 people could be affected by floods in three
districts of the central Mozambican province of Zambezia. The flood
threat follows heavy rains upstream in neighbouring Zambia, which
prompts the local authorities to open floodgates of the southern Kariba
dam.
29 Dec 2000 - The Mozambican government
approves a flooding contingency plan for the current rainy season, which
ends in late February.
28 Sept 2000 - Unseasonable early rain
showers in southern Mozambique, around the capital Maputo. Humanitarian
officials and weather forecasters do not expect major floods on the
scale of the freak cyclonic storms earlier in the year
Feb 1997 - Flooding in the provinces of
Sofala, Tete and Zambezia
Feb 1985 - Incomati river overflowed. Heavy
flooding in Maputo |
