Bhola cyclone

On the night of November 12 to 13, 1970, a tropical cyclone struck the low-lying Ganges delta in East Pakistan, now Bangladesh. Winds near 185 kilometers per hour pushed a storm surge of several meters over the islands and coastal districts, including Bhola, Hatiya and Char Tazumuddin, arriving at high tide. Estimates of the dead run from 300,000 to 500,000, making it the deadliest tropical cyclone on record. Most victims were fishing and farming families with no high ground to flee to.¹

The delta was densely populated, with few embankments and almost no cyclone shelters, and warnings were issued but widely misunderstood or ignored. The disaster also fell in a deep political divide. East Pakistan lay some 1,600 kilometers from the West Pakistan capital with India in between, and Bengalis had long complained of economic neglect and cultural domination. When the government of Yahya Khan was slow and seen as indifferent in the relief effort, anger grew. In the December 1970 elections the Awami League of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman won 160 of 162 East Pakistani seats, and when Islamabad refused to hand over power, the crisis led to military repression in March 1971, civil war, and the independence of Bangladesh in December 1971.¹²⁴

Historians see the cyclone as a catalyst more than a sole cause, since the grievances already existed. Bangladesh later built a Cyclone Preparedness Programme, with volunteers, warnings and many concrete shelters. Deaths from later storms fell sharply, to about 138,000 in 1991 and to a few thousand in the 2007 cyclone Sidr.²³