According to some media reports, the villagers of Hassanabad, Gilgit-Baltistan live in a constant fear. Above them, the vast Shisper glacier dominates the landscape, a river of jagged black ice moving towards them at a pace of four meters per day. Last year, the surging Shisper glacier effectively dammed a melt-water stream from a neighbouring glacier creating a large lake. The authorities were forced to issue safety warnings to Hassanabad and local villages before the water was drained. Satellite data shows the lake is already reforming, leaving residents fearing not only the progression of the crushing ice sheet but that they will be swept to their deaths in flash floods. Climate change is causing most glaciers worldwide to shrink, but due to a meteorological anomaly this is one of the few in Karakoram mountain range in Northern Pakistan that are surging. This means that hundreds of tons of ice and debris are pushing down the valley at 10 times the normal rate or more, threatening the safety of the people in homes below. Human lives, properties and animals are in extreme danger. The Karakoram, which contains world's some tallest mountains, including K2, is just one of the mountains ranges that crisscross the Hindukush-Himalayan region. Sometimes called The Third Pole, the region holds more ice than anywhere other than the Arctic or Antarctica. But a third of the glaciers here are expected to melt by 2100, endangering the lives of hundreds of millions, according to Hindukush-Himalaya Assessment Report.
KHAN FARAZ (FORMER SECRETARY PAKISTAN TOBACCO BOARD)
It is pertinent to note that flash floods caused by glacial lakes, ice and rock falls, and a lack of clean and accessible water are all serious risks for those close to its path. When a glacial lake bursts, there is an enormous amount of not only ice, water and debris that falls through, but also mud and this has devastating effects, it basically destroys everything that comes in its way. It is to be added that Indus River is reliant on seasonal melt for more than half of its flow and changes in Pakistan's ice fields affecting this. That has implications not just for those living in its basin, but for the whole nation, which relies on it for much of its food. The waterway's basin produces 90 percent of Pakistan's food, according to UN, and the agriculture is dependent on irrigation from the Indus river.
In view of the above, experts are of the view that Pakistan must adapt its monitoring and response strategies, and risk management in general to content with both surging and shrinking glaciers. Also, the country has to increase its water storage capacity which is now 33 days it should be at least 100 days to ensure sustainable development. Initiation of construction of Mohmand Dam and expected start of work on Diamer-Bhasha Dam are steps in the right direction. It is estimated that 60 percent of water is currently lost as run-off to the sea. With few functioning reservoirs, the country is ill-equipped to harness the short-term excess water as climate change causes more glaciers to melt, or from the increasingly erratic monsoon deluges.
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