Scientists at Indiana State University in the United States have concluded that more than 300 million people living in lowland river deltas are at risk of catastrophic flooding due to tropical storms that have become more deadly due to global warming. This is reported in an article published in the journal Nature Communications.
The researchers analyzed 2017 data for 2,174 river deltas around the world. It turned out that every tenth person in the world lives in floodplains, at risk of powerful cyclones that occur at least once a century, but the wind speed reaches destructive values equal to 350 kilometers per hour. However, an increase in ocean temperature and moisture in the atmosphere provoke an increase in the frequency of severe storms. At the same time, 329 million people live in developing and least developed countries.
Three quarters of the population lives in ten river basins, including the Ganges-Brahmaputra river system, home to 105 million, and the Nile Delta, home to 45 million. Inhabited river deltas, most of which are hit by tropical storms, are home to nearly 5 percent of humanity. The situation is aggravated by the fact that dams built in almost all main river systems prevent sedimentation in lowlands, which are natural defenses against tropical cyclones. In addition, the depletion of groundwater contributes to the subsidence of cities.
Experts say a third of Jakarta, the capital of Indonesia, home to 30 million people, could be flooded by 2050.
