Massive flooding in China further threatens the Three Gorges Dam

Flooding in Chongqing City. CBS News/AFP/Getty.

China's worst flooding in recent history is causing massive amounts of damage and may threaten the Three Gorges Dam. CBS News. An additional 100,000 people have been evacuated in Sichuan province as it reached the highest level of its flood control protocol. The Three Gorges Dam, which many have feared could collapse, reached it's highest levels on record with 90,000 cubic yards of water per second for nine hours straight. Chinese officials claim to be confident that the Dam will hold. So far the flood has killed at least 219 people and has forced the evacuation of 4 million people. The flooding has been so severe that even the giant Buddha in Leshan was flooded out. 

The Giant Buddha in Leshan. CBS/Reuters.

My Comment:

This news story dropped out of the public discourse for awhile due to improving conditions. However, the conditions changed fairly rapidly after a tropical storm hit the area. This erased any progress that was made and actually made the situation considerably worse. 

It's pretty clear that China is doing whatever they can to save the Three Gorges Dam. To do so, they are allowing places both up and down stream from the dam to flood. By doing so they are trying to reduce the pressure on the dam.

Will it work? The Chinese officials want to make it sound like it is, but I have my doubts. For one thing, if the dam was about to collapse the Chinese government would never tell anyone until after it was happening. To admit there was a problem would cause them to lose face and that is something they will never allow. 

But I think it's possible that the dam will fail and if it does it would be the worst man made disaster in history. Such a collapse would cause millions of deaths and billions of dollars of damage. It would throw the world's economy for a loop as well as the world is dependent on the manufacturing downstream of the dam. 

The thing is, that even if China is able to save their dam, this is still massive disaster. There has been major damage done to dozens of cities now and much of China's food producing areas have been flooded out. Billions of dollars of damage has already been done. 

It's even worse though as the massive damage to the crops of China is complicated by two other disasters. A massive swarm of desert locusts has struck China and also decimated some of their crops. And the outbreak of African Swine Fever has forced China to cull much of their pig herds. Right now China might be dependent on imports to feed their people, assuming there is enough international food supplies to go around. 

Of course if the dam collapses food will only be one of the problems for China. They will likely have civil disorder problems as well. China has always operated on the mandate of heaven and the world's worst human caused disaster would almost certainly convince people that the Communist government of China no longer holds it. Even if China were up to the task of rebuilding after a massive collapse, I doubt the people of China wouldn't hold the government to account. After all, this was an entirely avoidable disaster. The flooding would have always happened but if they hadn't built the massive dam the threat of a breach wouldn't exist.