Rain on My Window, Typhoons on My Mind - Reminiscing on Past Disaster

It's another wet day here in Da Nang, and I am beginning to think the rainy season may have come a bit early this year. It was just a few days ago that Viet Nam experienced its 5th typhoon of the year, Typhoon Kajiki, with another storm said to be intensifying as I write this. Kajiki mostly missed Da Nang, but did cause a lot of flooding and some deaths up in north central Viet Nam, from Ha Tinh to Thanh Hoa. My wife’s family lives in this area, where they said the strong winds and flooding caused some damage, but everyone is luckily okay.

Storms are a common occurrence in this part of the world, and I have lived through quite a few in my time here. There is one that I find is the most memorable to me, and that was Typhoon Noru, which hit Da Nang back in September of 2022. At the time, I was living in an apartment on the 9th floor, and I remember vividly the strong wind and rain through the night. It was like someone was powerwashing the windows and balcony door. Some rainwater started coming in from the balcony while I was watching a movie, I didn’t notice until I got up to get a drink and stepped in the puddle. Luckily I caught this relatively quickly, and put some towels down to contain it before anything could be damaged. The power went out briefly, but my building had a generator that kicked on shortly after, so it wasn’t really a problem for us. Now I live in a house, which is certainly more spacious, however, the power does occasionally go out, and in those moments I miss my cozy little apartment, and that trusty generator.

The next morning, I went for a walk to the beach to assess the damage. The air had a mist to it, and the wind still blew with considerable strength, with some gusts feeling like they might carry you away.

Many trees had gone down, some store-front windows were broken, and even some rooves had flown off.

There was a great deal of sand blown off the beach and onto the nearby street and boardwalk.

To my dismay, I found the part of the boardwalk that had all of the public workout equipment had collapsed into the beach. They have since redone that section of boardwalk, but unfortunately they have not replaced the workout equipment that was previously there. I can’t seem to find a picture of this, so either I was too sad to take one or Google Photos is secretly deleting things.

Seeing the damage the city had sustained, I couldn’t help but feel for the people that had taken the brunt of this disaster, who didn’t have a high and sturdy building to shelter in. Outside of the city, there are still many in the countryside that live in unstable and low lying buildings, making them more at risk during these kinds of storms.

I am pleased to say that the Vietnamese government in Da Nang has been very proactive about cutting trees and securing infrastructure around the city in the following years. In the week leading up to this most recent storm, the city had teams all going all around cutting, clearing and tying down any potential problems.

Hopefully this current storm doesn’t get too serious, and I can just enjoy the sound of the rain tapping on my window. I hope you enjoyed this little trip down memory lane.

All photos were taken by me. Have a wonderful day.