It was evident the next morning that the storm was anything but the usual Hindu-Kush shower. Reports started trickling in of land-slides along the major roadway south of our base. It was about noon when I received word that a major section of roadway had been completely covered by a land-slide, and that several villagers had been killed. About an hour later I found myself in a humvee enroute to the location of the landslide: Sunderwa village.
The ride to Sunderwa village was slightly tense- no one really knew what to expect, and the villagers of that area had a track record of not playing nice with coalition forces. We arrived just as a memorial service was ending- several hundred people had gathered to say goodbye to the seven adults and three children that perished in the landslide. As a gesture of goodwill, our civil affairs team brought some humanitarian assistance in the form of rice and flour. This foodstuff was given to a local police chief to distribute- it is a top priority of the PRT to put the "Afghan" face on activities, and what better way to build support for the local police than for them to provide humanitarian aid in the time of need.
Once the team had dismounted from the vehicles our objectives were to discuss the event with the locals and assess the damage to the area. The damage was immediately evident- about 200 meters of roadway was impassable because of debris.
Walking where the road used to be.
Large debris caused the road to end abruptly.After getting GPS grid points on the damaged road, we proceeded to walk through what used to be farmland for the village. Approximately 25% of their farmland had been washed away by the flash-flood/landslide, leaving a new river bed in it's place.
This used to be farmland. Now it is a river bed.
Also used to be farmland.
Same story here- some surviving terraced farmland can be seen in the left hand side of the picture.
The flood carved out an impressive new channel for water, as seen above. The villagers, however, asked for a wall to be built that would divert all future water flow through the original channel. Myself and my civilian engineer Will spent the better part of an hour explaining that this was nature's way of dictating where the water should flow. We explained that another storm like this would destroy any wall, and that the new river bed should be utilized for future rain storms. We cautioned that although it was likely to be some time before a storm of this caliber hit again, they should start taking precautions now to prevent a similar situation. The response from the village elders was slightly stunning: "we need this farmland now. In several years, who knows where we will be. We might be rich and no longer here. But we need farmland now." A final solution has yet to be reached on the issue, and the problem itself is indicative of Afghanistan in general. Some might call the villagers request short-sighted, but 30 years of warfare has made surviving another day the top priority. How can you ask someone to plan for something ten years from now when there is little guarentee they will even be alive at the end of the week?
On a good note: the PRT hired a local contractor to clear the road within 48 hours. Below is the result.
On a sour note: the police chief who was supposed to distribute the humanitarian aid (rice, flour) ended up stealing it all. What an ass-hole.
In other news: congratulations to Charles Bartlett for getting promoted to Chief. Chief Bartlett is the reason PRT Nuristan is able to go on missions. His tireless efforts in the maintenance shop keep our vehicles mission capable.
Me and the Chief!
