The Chinese aren’t afraid of extreme measures. Here’s a great example: this week the Chinese have bombed the frozen Yellow River to help prevent flooding in Mongolia. Now, when I say bomb I don’t mean they threw some fire crackers out there, I mean the army got a real life military aircraft (that could have been out looking for a certain missing airliner) and bombed the living bejeezus out of the icy crust.
Even as I’m writing this I’m smiling to myself and thinking “those crazy guys with their crazy ideas, what are they thinking?” But then I realised that I have no idea how to prevent flooding in Mongolia so who am I to judge their methods? It’s their river, let them nuke the shizzle out of if they see fit.
When I think of a frozen river I think of a thin crust of ice, but China’s ultra-nippy winter temperatures mean that this bad boy is SOLID. As a vivid example, below is a picture of a man who didn’t want to pay the 50p bridge toll and drove his car the entire width of it. What a grade-A lunatic. It does give you an idea of how thick the ice is though:
It just doesn’t seem worth the risk:
Apparently ice flooding is an annual concern in China, especially in late winter or early spring. In general the Chinese get way more than their fair share of flooding.
When the surface of a river remains frozen but the water underneath keeps on flowing there can be trouble. The flowing water pushes ice downriver into the dams that are in place to stop floods. All this jagged ice ramming against the dams can bust ’em wide open and you don’t want that.
They dropped over 20 shells in the end and I hope it did the trick, I really do. The video’s on the next page, it’s pretty cool tbh…
☛ Next Up: PHOTOS: The Mysterious Chinese Longyou Grotto
