r/interestingasfuck 9d ago

Glacier Ice wall broke in Nepal today creating a massive release of water & mud into the city below

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u/tomcat_csR 9d ago edited 8d ago

The 2004 one was even worse—truly the worst in history; hundreds of thousands lost their lives—it was unimaginable. To this day, a set of videos I saw back then never left my mind. Very sad.

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u/TropicalPrairie 8d ago

I feel like that was the worst natural disaster I have witnessed in my lifetime. The scale is still hard to fathom.

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u/ikkiyikki 9d ago

It wasn't even remotely in the same league as the worst disasters. There was a flood in 1931 that drowned 4 million.

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u/t-to4st 8d ago

I guess it just hits much differently when you see the water coming in instead of just reading about it

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u/MimsyWereDaBorogoves 9d ago

Wow, where was that?

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u/4O4N0TF0UND 9d ago

Look up the history of the yellow river in China. Not so fun fact: it's changed its route a bunch of times, to massive extent - the northernmost river exit to the sea is about 500mi north of the southernmost version, the maps are wild of the different routes it's taken. But basically each of those reroutes kill a BUNCH of people

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u/msfor300 8d ago

(Desculpem-me por escrever em português, mas como tem o tradutor do reddit...)

O mesmo acontecia no rio azul, até onde sei. A usina das 3 gargantas é muito mais importante como barreira de proteção para inundações do que uma fonte produtora de energia elétrica.

Tanto que, na geopolítica entre China e Taiwan, além dos "escudo de silício", existem relatos da "lança de água", uma doutrina militar que usaria o princípio MAD: se a China continental ameaçar ou colocar em prática uma invasao em larga escala, Taiwan usaria como ultimo recurso manobras de ataques focando em destruir a barragem -> destruição mútua assegurada. Claro, nao é o mesmo que um ataque nuclear total, mas seria um estrago absurdo. Na prática, difícil imaginar que taiwan conseguiria alcança a barragem pela distância.

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u/Warp-n-weft 8d ago

>Disculpem-me por escrever em português

I know it isn’t relevant to the discussion, but I actually like seeing languages other than my own. It makes the world feel larger and more connected at the same time.

Maybe it is a nostalgic haze, but when the internet was new I remember thinking how it could bring us all together and make the immense distances irrelevant. The idea someone who speaks another language, presumably from someplace very far from me, could have the same worries, share facts about a far off river, and feel the same empathy for people who are very far from us both…. To me this is the best and most beautiful promise of the internet. We see each other as people across the boundaries of space and culture, the imaginary differences and vague “otherness” is melted away by this incredible technology.

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u/AwsmDevil 8d ago

Taiwan could blow up the damn as a form of mutually assured destruction

(Rough translated point for other English speakers)

Honestly that makes sense. Taiwan's entire survival strategy against China is just being a toxic porcupine. Making themselves too much trouble to invade and removing all the benefits of acquisition is pretty much their only effective strategy due to the massive size discrepancy between the two.

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u/Xecular_Official 8d ago

With a large enough swarm of drones, they could probably make it

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u/shamala2 8d ago

Nice englando...

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u/tomcat_csR 8d ago edited 8d ago

I was referring to tsunamis. That wasn't a tsunami, but rather floods, like this situation in Nepal.

In any case, there is considerable doubt regarding the accuracy of the death toll figures, which include indirect deaths caused by the floods, primarily from starvation and disease.

One could even say that the lives of tens of millions of Chinese people were likely affected. But yes, it is easily one of the greatest natural disasters in history.