Giant ravines: The global phenomenon swallowing whole neighbourhoods - BBC World Service 

It is not just rain, it is deforestation. The only thing holding the soil together is the vegetation. Once you remove the vegetation to build houses, roads, etc, the soil becomes unprotected and prone to erosion.

How about stop chopping down all of the forest / rainforest then.

Just by looking at the soil, you can clearly see that the land is so ripped for massive landslides

I was on a bus in western China a while ago. I remarked to a man sitting next to me that the desert of rocks that we were riding through wasn't on the map. He said that when they printed the map it was a forest, but they cut it down and didn't replant it.

In my town in South Africa they built a huge shopping centre - covered many hectares with concrete and asphalt - and sent the storm water down into a small stream. Over the past 20 years the rainfall has changed there and flash floods now happen every year, sometimes a couple of times a year. The water runnoff going down that little stream is now far too much and it washed away the railway line and flooded the old town centre. It caused billions of Rands in damage, yet the owners of the shopping centre didn't have to compensate - in fact nobody seems to have considered that it was all their water runoff that exaserbated the problem. And then on the north coast of the city they are building huge housing complexes, but just bulldozing all the ground of many hectares completely bare. Similar problem - flash floods - and all the houses down the hilll got smothered in mud. And here too it seems the constructors weren't blamed for their actions. Sure there is not much we can do now to stop the flash floods - the amount of rainfall - but people definately need to think about where the runoff is going to go. We need to tripple our water runoff capacity - storm water drains. Or build water holding areas and let them empty the water out slowly after the rain. Builders need to be carefull when clearing the ground for construction, they need to build stop dams and lay fabric over the bare soil to reduce the impact of the rain, then revegetate the ground as soon as possible.

Like our ancestors used to do, humans have to adapt and move. The land can only be abused for so long then Mother Nature changes it for you. It is happening all over the entire planet.

Mother Nature vs. the people of Earth and Mother Nature always wins, she will always have her way. The best we can manage is compromise and get outta the way as she comes through, whether it’s rainfall or sinkholes or tornadoes.

It's always fascinated me how humans move into locations that are clearly compromised and yet don't understand when things go wrong. Move into a valley, expect focused water flow, move into flatlands, expect flooding, move into sandy unstable land, expect erosion. Humans.

Nature must be protected

Before I listened, I wondered if deforestation could be to blame? Without tress to bind the land - erosion is that much easier as well as depleting the water table/s. Land sink and deforms causing stress elsewhere. We think we are using intelligence to advance, but without wisdom - we are doomed.

Poor people, wish them the best!

I liked this video, there should be more such videos and good reporting.

Corruption .they just don't care about their people .feel so bad for them

It’s time to move guys.

Always remember it is not ours nature is the truthful owners

its from deforestation

Click here to subscribe to our channel 👉🏽 bbc.in/3VyyriM

There's no reason why businesses that cut down woods and forrests can't seed or replant the areas they cut down at the same time. They can make better plans when engineering new roads or sub divisions for the rain run off. It's past time to blame these companies and government projects for cutting corners for profit. What are they doing to fix these issues before these problems show up.

Gabions may help in the places where the storm gullies already have cut into soil. They are just big boxes of large rock, that drain water quickly. Gabion courses can be built starting from low ground, and the sides of gullies can be shored with plastic grids (recycled from plastic bottles or bags) and planted with something that will root deeply. The gabions can be branched out to make terraces as they go higher. It may buy some time.

This is a huge problem in Turkey for decades as well 😮

In North Island our country suffered huge landslides and flooding beginning of this year too Many homes lost and lives

Hemp has the strongest roots and grow over twelve feet in all directions. Loves Sandy soil and is able to absorb a lot of rain.

How about planting more trees Nd stopping cutting down the ones you have .it isn't rocket science 😂

It's far more likely that over-population and poor land practices are causing these erosion problems, rather than rainfall.

Good video as usual!❤

João has the right idea. if it could be suggested that organic materials, i.e. vegetable/fruit waste, be separated from simply going to the lanfills, and instead be directly deposited into the gullies, that will also help- inhibiting erosion from inside out, as well as what he is doing outside in...

Atmospheric rivers are on the rise since higher atmospheric temperatures allow far more water to be released in rains storms. They need to replant native trees and even bamboo and trees that will stabilize the clay soils. Also the concrete ditches will help. This is also happening more frequently in Puerto Rico.

The poor will continue to pay the biggest price for rich nations creating the climate crisis. So sad.

I llive in a place with this type of soil and these landslides are ALWAYS linked to deforestation. Whenever a patch of land collapses, the edge of the cliff will have native trees holding it back while the rest is washed away. If we really wanna ditch the nomadic way of life we have to learn to live among trees and native vegetation, otherwise the land cannot stand the stress of human activities.

This reminds me of the Grand Canyon . The sand looks like it has no rocks in it-like a desert that stuff just happened to grow in and stabilize it, but humans come in and destroy the delicate balance

I'm a chick forest technician from Montreal, I majored in Sylviculture and re-wilding the place but it is an old boys' club in charge, the earth can only function as we find it in its natural environment!

Roguemos a Deus por Paz Justiça e Liberdade, no Brasil !

I saw one of these in the US one time. It looked like a miniature Grand Canyon, very deep and long with very colorful soil layers, right in the middle of flat lands near the Louisiana/Mississippi border. I assumed it was really old and some kind of ancient river bed. Turned out it wasn’t that old, I think it might have started forming in the 1800s and it’s growing so fast they have had to move the nearby highway twice. Fortunately nothing is built near it and it’s now surrounded by trees (think I read it was a farmers field originally) so it’s not growing as dramatically as the ones in this video. But you can see how the rain cuts through the soft soil like butter here and other than making sure the trees aren’t cut there is nothing humans can do to stop it.

Please grow more tree 😢

"I only saved my wife and children", is a really good day in my book.

The Bayfield Wisconsin floods of 1942, 1946, 1951 & 1953 led to them building a concrete sluiceway to capture and divert the storm runoff and halt erosion. This is not a new phenomenon. Hills erode by natural processes. Living there speeds up the processes and you have to take measures to slow it down.

Dear Brazil, it's simple. QUIT CHOPPING ALL YOUR TREES DOWN.

Water table is dropping. Unwise water use and erosion.

Pumping out all of that ground water doesn’t help! Urbanization of many areas of the planet are exposing the fragility of their existence.

Message received.

There is always going to be heavy rain in the tropics, this is not new or unfixable. They don't need to build concrete channels over everything there are other ways of controlling flow that can be achieved through basic earth works. Trees are also cheap. To expensive is an excuse. Not thinking outside of a box.

The earth is constantly forming. That's a fact we must always accept and consider.

Irresponsible building is always the reason for this sort of erosion.

Bamboo! Good thinking man!

Lots of sand makes these hills unstable .

standard loose sandy soil known for its severe instability so building on it is ridiculous

The quicker we destroy the environment, the sooner Humans will be gone so the Earth can eventually heal from all the damage we are doing.

Seems to be lesser or absence of rocks or rock strata. Just granular soil. If the top soil, with its veneer of trees, grass, shrubs is stripped away, the loose soil underneath cannot withstand the power of water...

These people are wonderful. Now they make good use of the gullies as trash dumps.

Ravines have been around since time began. The sudden difference is deforestation. Long term, who knows.

Its called a drainage system.

So sad

what happen ?

Y ahí había árboles que es lo que mantiene la tierra junta, si si se cortan todos los árboles, así vamos a terminar. Pero las lluvias no tienen la culpa si no hay árboles que consuman esa agua, así pasan los deslaves

Don't worry, the earth has been through a lot worse than humans, it'll survive.

this cannot be stopped, the earth is splitting in half

The jungle wants its land back 😅

It's de-forestation that is causing extreme weather events. And everything else

💔😢

Price to pay for chopping rain Forrest down

holy word soup. DON'T BUILD A HOUSE ON TOP OF AN ANT HILL, IN AN AREA FULL OF ANT HILL TYPE SAND DUNES. i figued this out when i was six years old

I was looking at residential plots in some new developments in my country. All of them had retention ponds located in the development. I asked a guy in charge of a very small place and asked him if this was standard now - and he said yes. They are now required to have them in order to control the flow of runoff downstream. This wasn't a thing in past developments, it is now. You need to build for climate resilience.

VERY CLEAR THE PEOPLE do not know THE PRINCIPLE OF BENCHING OR EVEN WATTLING...THE GEOLOGIST KNOWS THE Splash effect of water BUT SHE doesn't know the solution.

The problem could be solved by building proper drainage but of course who is going to pay for it.

Climate change is a smaller factor than deforestation. The core problem causing erosion like this is the significant increase in water runoff directly attributable to cutting down trees further up in the watershed. Sadly, talking about deforestation is uncool.

Greed! That's all it is, when land get's developed not sufficient money is spend on dewatering, sewage, canals. Cheaper to blame "climate change" and raise taxes.

Learn to live in good places. Don't live in dangerous places. The earth moves all the time

A mãe natureza está revoltada...e está pedindo tudo que é dela por direito. Não podemos medir forças com ela...precisamos mudar de comportamento agora.

That is an active gully, no one should build a house in a gully...you will know that it is a gully by just looking at the topographic map of the area. Or maybe they build the area for residential houses without considering thE natural storm drainage of the area. Sometimes it is not the weather to be blamed but it is the people who lacks the technical kNowledge on HYDROLOGY. ALL THEY KNOW IS BUILD, BUILD, BUILD.

I didn’t know that they spoke French there

That’s what happens to gullys and bluffs etc naturally without any change in climate

But the met gala couldn't be swallowed up??

"I lost everything, I only saved my wife and children". Hmmmmmmmmmmm.

B.S. Those gigantic perfectly round holes, are made by the same laser powered weapons that made the hole in the Russia Mall ceiling from Sky to Floor.

We are all responsible

That’s what you get

And it's all because of oil drilling and fracking. Mining

This what happens when you peal the land back

The rich come in take their profits and leave us the mess.

natural disasters are very dangerous always

Do not build or live there - it’s that simple!!!

*vetiver

Slowly turning to sand

I think the problem is and continues to be is that nature is there doing it's thing whether we like it or not. Then we come along and make a living on top of it, then co.plaint about nature being nature. 😅

The theory of relativity... It depends on people's choices of their own.

Karma

The things we do to this planet are unconscionable. We are a terrible, terrible species.

If they did not remove all trees this would not happen. You have to know the Earth to know where to be able to build, we cannot stay forever victims in these situations, we need to educate each other and make sure people understand the risks of removing all vegetation. If there is not trees to hold the moist air, then it will go into Earth and create the moist in the Earth and that will lead to problems like this, water will remove and erode away soil, or the Earth dries up and can no longer hold together. There are many versions of what happens when we remove vegetation and do not honor Earth. We see this issue all over the world, desertification and bad management of our heritage here on this planet. Even in EU they have taken down to many trees. Then when we get floods etc we say it is 'climate change' but it has nothing to do with climate change and all to do with human activity. We fill Earths orbit with space junk, there is so much junk out there it deflects a lot of sunlight but it also keeps the humidity in. We are the cause to all our problems and we are the only ones who can and will have to do something about it, or we will eventually be 'flushed'.

Foolish! cutting down the trees .... the love of money!

They wantonly abused their environment. Sorry that happened.

If land is all u have than you had no life anyway. CLOWN SHOW

This is just what the earth does...but keep acting like it is new or something.

we used to show empathy and feel sad with these kind of news but after the reality show in Palestine we are taugh that after 2024 its every man for him self. The best we could do is press like on this video

There is no cost too high the poor will have to pay for the rich to get even richer.

😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂

When they announce "And the Nobel Prize goes to..." It's never Brazil. 🙄. They created this problem themselves.

Keeping ignoring me 😭🫒🕎

I disagree...im an earth science nut....THE PLANET HAS ACTUALLY Grown LARGER AND TILTED BACK OF ITS AXIS NO MAN CAN STOP THIS NATURAL PROGRESS. .. the small errors made by man are compounded by a 12000 year cycle we just hit a tutning point In the evolution of earth. And we are in a 200 uear flood cycle its natural cleansing if THE PLANET ITSELF NEVER STAYS STILL WE WILL ALWAYS SEE CHANGES .😮

Mass wasting is a thing. Remember when BBC had a Nature section? Pepperidge Farms remembers.

This is what democracy gets you!