We are all Tuvaluans - Page 4
From Griffith REVIEW Edition 12: Hot Air
© Copyright Griffith University & the author.
Written by Mark Hayes
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 28. BRIGHT YELLOW SUNSHINE BATHES THE ATOLL, a gently cooling breeze caresses it and rustles the palm trees, and, with the tide approaching its lowest, the lagoon's colour ranges from bright green close to shore to deep blue. A few locals are lazing in the shallows or tending to their boats for a fishing trip later today. This glorious sight is tropical atoll paradise travel-brochure stuff.
But there was no glory for several households on the edge of a northern taisala last night, because, with a slightly higher tide peaking at over
3.2 metres just before 5pm, polluted water flooded into their homes, and they were evacuated by the Red Cross. Seawater seepage occurred around the atoll, but Te Namo and the Pacific did not break through to cause any serious damage. Some locals told how they'd caught fish washed into their kitchens from the overflowing taisala.
Today's the day, according to the predictions, that Tuvalu will experience the highest tide between 1990 and 2016, at 3.26 metres at about 5.30pm.
The Met office folks say the persistent high-altitude convergence over the country is making the weather benign, but some Tuvaluans no doubt believe Te Atua (The Almighty) heard their prayers and blessed them with good weather.
Funafuti's thin lifeline to the south, its thrice weekly Air Fiji flights, was severed again today. The flight was cancelled, this time due to vandalism at this end. Just south of the airstrip, the BBC crew that's here shooting segments for nature documentaries, has set up a time-lapse camera on a concrete slab near the entrance to a small cluster of houses and fales near the Assemblies of God church and hall.
Getting some "before" pictures, we head further south to where Te Namo's broken through near the end of the road. Only fifteen minutes have passed, but the little village is now deeply awash, with children running about pushing small pieces of wood through the flood like toy motor boats, watched by stoic adults hoping it doesn't rise any higher.
Further north, the road is awash and I force the car through the water in low gear, past adults up to their shins and playing kids. They've never seen it so high here, they tell me as I wade back.
Out along the long airstrip, the sports teams look like clusters of ants, occasionally tossing up splashing water as a player chases a ball to the flooded verges.
The Taiwanese garden supervisor is anxious about the seepage into his gardens. Earlier he soaked the place with fresh water to try to protect the plants.
More flooding scattered along Funafuti to the north. I'm reminded of storms back home, where some suburbs can be flooded or damaged, while nearby, evenings are entirely normal. Rather strange, driving north through ‘suburban' Fongafale with its yellow street lights, towards flooded taisala and more scattered, local flooding seeping around some lower parts.
At the Met office, its front yard again awash in shin-deep water lapping at the front step, Hilia accesses the raw data from the tide monitor at the port complex, and exclaims that this has been a record high tide for Funafuti – just over 3.438 metres, exactly as she predicted.
We say goodnight and wade and then walk home, grateful to either the benign weather or God's benevolence, or both, that this high tide left Tuvalu and Funafuti relatively unscathed.
FRIDAY AFTERNOON, MARCH 3. A LATE AFTERNOON TROPICAL STORM is drenching Funafuti Atoll, pouring thick rain across the island from even thicker, darker clouds that blew in from the north-west.
The fresh rainwater will quickly disappear once the storm passes, topping up the water tanks, percolating into the polluted water table beneath the atoll and turning into poison beneath the ground.
The Prime Minister, Hon Maatia Toafa, and the Secretary to Government, Panapasi Nelesone, watch the storm with us and chat about the week and its record high tides at a time when international attention is increasingly focusing on global warming and the related rises in sea levels. They know that they cannot rely on prayer alone, and are committed to plans to ensure the survival of Tuvalu and its people.
The extremely high tides this week have nothing to do with global warming and sea-level rise, even though the seas have risen slightly over the years of detailed measurements. But the attention paid to global warming makes the world more acutely aware of the plight of those living in the vast Pacific Ocean.
Maybe the sustained active convergence zone that made the local weather so benign can partially be attributed to global warming, but the models used are just not sensitive enough to be useful even over a large area like Tuvalu's 900,000 square kilometre exclusive economic zone.
If the extreme tides had coincided with a storm like the one that ended the week, there would have been much worse flooding and more damage. Global warming and its predicted effects on Tuvalu will weaken an already fragile environment vulnerable to very high tides, storms and sea surges, with damage amplified by erosion, groundwater pollution and seepage, loss of vegetation and weakened reefs. Tuvaluans with sympathetic palagi assistance are not waiting for this to happen. Instead they are struggling to ameliorate the worst effects and develop a long-term survival plan, improving the health and education of the children and providing them with the means to draw on the best the world has to offer. ♦