1954 Yangtze River Floods

From June to September of 1954, the Yangtze River Floods were a series of catastrophic floodings that occurred mostly in Hubei Province. Due to unusually high volume of as well as an extraordinarily long rainy season in the middle stretch of the Yangtze River late in the spring of 1954, the river started to rise above its usual level in around late June. Despite efforts to open three important flood gates to alleviate the rising water by diverting it, the flood level continued to rise until it hit the historic high of 44.67 m in Jingzhou, Hubei and 29.73 m in Wuhan. The number of dead from this flood was estimated at around 33,000, including those who died of in the aftermath of the disaster.

Casualties

Partly as a result of this flood, the pressure to build a new dam, the Three Gorges Dam, in the upper reach of Yangtze river, gained considerable momentum.

Commemoration

In 1969, a large stone monument was erected in the riverside park in Hankou honoring the heroic deeds in fighting the 1954 flood. Among the carvings on the monument is a calligraphic inscription by Mao Zedong, dedicated to the people of Wuhan:

Below, is his poem "Swimming" , envisioning future bridge and dam construction on the Yangtze.

Comparison

Compared to the 1998 Yangtze River Floods, this flooding was more severe in terms of total flow of water, but less in terms of the highest level that the flood water reaches. This is probably a result of the intense logging on the banks of the upper reach of Yangtze River during the later part of the 20th century.