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 Zunahme der Länder mit Hochwasserrisiko infographic
Grafik zeigt die Länder mit erhöhtem Hochwasser bis 2030.
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WETTER

Hochwassergefahr für immer mehr Menschen

By Duncan Mil

August 5, 2021 - Satellitenbilder von 913 großen Hochwasser Ereignissen seit 2000 zeigen, dass der Prozentsatz der globalen Bevölkerung, die von Hochwasser bedroht ist, seit 2000 um rund ein Viertel zugenommen hat – derzeit zwischen 255 und 290 Millionen Menschen..

New research published in the journal Nature, ahead of the COP26 UN Climate Change Conference in Glasgow, found that between 2000 to 2015, the number of people living in flood-prone areas increased by an estimated 58 million to 86 million.

A summer of extreme flooding devastated Germany and Nigeria and killed more than 300 people in China, triggering arguments about levels of preparation.

“It’s not surprising that we’re seeing really large floods that are potentially unprecedented affecting countries like China,” Beth Tellman, lead author of the study, told CNN. “This is exactly what the climate models have predicted.”

Scientists at Cloud to Street -- an analytics company that developed the Global Flood Database -- analyzed flood exposure using satellite observations between 2000 and 2018.

Floods inundated some 2.2 million square kilometres (861,000 square miles) of land in 32 countries. Nearly 90% of the floods analyzed occurred in South and Southeast Asia, particularly in China, India and Bangladesh, where migration has increased significantly since 2000.

Tellman et al. say the critical drivers of flooding are heavy rainfall, tropical storms or surges and snow and ice melt.

Looking to the future, the authors estimate that by 2030, there will be an extra 25 countries experiencing increasing floods.

Sources
PUBLISHED: 06/08/2021; STORY: Graphic News; PICTURES: Getty Images
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