The other problem as a US citizen is that the Homeland Security folks may brand us as terrorists for donating to Islamic charities. those guys have the intelligence of a snapping turtle and the sense of humor, too. I wish there was a Secular Humanist pope so we could donate without a religeous or political implication. (thats irony, you humorless SOB's)

Hello Prof. Goose & Leanan,

I am certainly not a skilled satellite photo analyst, but from my examination of the photo: my guess is the general topsoil is very poor and geo-sparse in this country. Most food is probably imported, and with the roads washed out--this only compounds the problem. The heavy rainfall from Gonu might have washed out alot of any farmland/gardens from severe erosion: this will take years to replenish the topsoil and restore planting and harvesting yields.

Another crucial factor is possible damage to any irrigation system infrastructure. My much earlier post detailed that most inland aquifers were quite brackish-- I am not expert enough to know whether brackish water can be used directly on crops or whether it must be desalination processed first. But if the flashfloods took out established irrigation canals, then this will be a very expensive and time-consuming process to restore. Thus, I would expect food prices in Oman to continue to rise quite rapidly for years to come as we go postPeak.

The tremendous outflow of silt and debris into the ocean will have drastic effects on fishing, too. I would expect tremendous algae blooms to drive fisheries much further offshore-- more fisherman fuel required, and lower yields until subsea habitat equilibrium re-establishes itself. I am not familiar with ocean currents in this area, but hopefully huge patches of anoxic seawater will not arise.

What is upsetting to me is that Oman is quite geo-similar to the deserts of my SW US. But I doubt if my local leaders will learn from this Omani tragedy and go to early mitigation. They want golf courses, shopping malls, and maximum asphalt instead. Even the leading sustainability research institution here talks glowingly of oxymoronic 'sustainable growth'. =(

Bob Shaw in Phx,Az Are Humans Smarter than Yeast?

Courtesy of DIYer, a screenshot of Sur from Google Earth, before Gonu:

http://www.theoildrum.com/files/sur.jpg