Extreme weather, climate change poses threat to global infrastructure

With a seasonal river running through it from the highlands to the south, Libya's coastal city of Derna always had been vulnerable to flooding. So, when engineers from the former Yugoslavia built a pair of dams near Derna in the 1970s, residents welcomed the project as a blessing-the protection they so badly needed from dangerous floodwaters that had devastated their lands in years past. But now, the Mediterranean city of 90,000 is burying its dead after record-breaking rainfall from powerful Storm Daniel produced floodwaters that likely overwhelmed the two damns and led to their collapse. After the dams failed, a wall of water several stories high ripped through the city, crashing into buildings, washing entire neighborhoods out to sea, and drowning thousands of people. More than 11,000 have died, according to the Libyan Red Crescent, and thousands more are missing. Officials fear the death count could reach 20,000. A NASA satellite captured this image of medicane Daniel on Sept.