The notable glaciers in northern Pakistan namely Karakoram, Hindu Kush and Himalayan are seen to be rapidly melting due to increasing temperatures. It is evident by creation of more than three thousand glacial lakes in the province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and federally administered territory of Gilgit Baltistan that has endangered the lives of over 7 million people. Nearly 33 of the glacial lakes are life risky for the tourists, residents and the trekkers. Additionally, they result in glacial lake outburst floods that entail a catastrophic damage for the human lives, property and infrastructure as well as create destruction for the livelihoods of farmers in the remote areas of the country.
Recently, the ever-increasing heat has accelerated the melting of glaciers and snow in the northern areas resulting in growing pressure on the glacial lakes. This accompanied with the beginning of monsoon rains has triggered the sudden outbursts from the lakes resulting in flash floods recently in Swat Valley and Chitral. Lately, nine unfortunate people of the same family while enjoying breakfast in the river and taking photographs were swept away by a flash flood. Such a tragic incident calls for implementation of stringent strategies to mitigate glacial lake outburst flood reduction in the northern parts of the country. The first and foremost strategy should focus on adoption of the early warning systems by the national and provincial disaster management authorities. These should cover public awareness campaigns and timely information to the relevant stakeholders related to ways to mitigate the impact of floods. It should also involve coordination and communication with government institutes, NGOs and local communities before and after the disasters to reduce the imminent damage. For example, Punjab disaster management authority provides for a SMS based early warning system for its residents in flood prone areas to ensure their safety and protection. It covers weather forecasts, reports on rainfall and weather conditions for keeping the people safe. Its effectiveness should be further strengthened so that the required stakeholders are able to take the pre-emptive measures for protecting the residents against natural hazards.
Furthermore, engineering structures are required to be improved that should include the construction of dams and mini dams to ensure that the water flow from the glacial lakes is regulated hence reducing the peak discharge amidst glacial lake outburst floods. Spillways should also be designed in a way that the dams are protected from being damaged and the excess water from the glacial lakes or reservoirs is safely released. Drainage systems should be further improved to manage the excessive water flow in the rain-affected regions and deforestation should be discouraged to reduce water erosion and to slow down outburst of glacial meltwater.
The project Scaling-up of Glacial Lake Outburst Flood (GLOF) risk reduction in northern Pakistan that spanned years 2017-2024 has built 250 engineering structures including dams, ponds and spill ways. It also covers afforestation practices and practices of water drainage to mitigate the risk of flood.
Disaster management policies should also be implemented for averting the risk of glacial lake outburst flooding by execution of hydrological and meteorological monitoring. These can comprise building weather monitoring stations, hydrological models in catchment areas and establishing flood gauges for collection of data related to forecasting occurrence of glacial lake outburst flooding. National disaster management policies should be concrete enough to ensure preparedness and response of the provincial authorities to tackle the onset of monsoon flooding and associated hazards for the local community.
The safe and effective implementation of the above-mentioned strategies is helpful in mitigating the impact of the glacial lake outburst floods on local communities and the existing infrastructure. They can be useful in establishment of safe and resilient communities of the country.
The writer is a freelance journalist and can be reached at [email protected]