what were the causes of the 2007 Bangladesh flood?

Short answer: abnormal monsoon patterns combining with faster than normal snow melt in the Himalayas.

Long answer: The 2007 South Asian floods were a series of floods in India, Nepal, Bhutan, Pakistan and Bangladesh. News Agencies, citing the Indian and Bangladeshi governments, place the death toll in excess of 2,000. By 3 August approximately 20 million had been displaced and by 10 August some 30 million people in India, Bangladesh and Nepal had been affected by flooding.

UNICEF said that the situation "is being described as the worst flooding in living memory".

B. P. Yadav of the Indian Meteorological Department reported that "we've been getting constant rainfall in these areas for nearly 20 days" due to abnormal monsoon patterns. Flooding in Pakistan began during the landfall of Cyclone 03B in June 2007. Pakistani states Balochistan and Sindh were particularly affected. Melting snow from the Himalayan glaciers increased the water levels of the Brahmaputra River.

On August 1, there was flooding on the Padma and Brahmaputra rivers. By 15 August, five million people were still displaced, the estimated death toll was nearly 500, and all six of Bangladesh's divisions were affected.

Bangladesh Floods 2007

Bangladesh has always been prone to flooding. They have alot of land that is right at sea level, so any significant rainstorm causes flooding in certain areas. In the past, few people lived in the flood prone areas so it was not as much of an issue.

As population has risen, people have been forced to live in the areas that flood alot.

The only solutions are for people to leave the flood prone land (which is not really viable), or to put large man made levies in (too expensive), or to raise the land (can't be done without billions of dollars).

It is more of an overpopulation issue than anything else.

also The geography is dominated by rivers; the Yamuna also known as the Brahmaputra, and the Ganges, known locally as Bodha Ganga. The rivers drain an area which is 12 times the size of Bangladesh.

Every year, one-third of the total area of the country gets inundated. This is normal and good for the economy and people.

2. Nature and Causes of Floods

There are four main types of floods, and one myth regarding their main cause.

1. River floods: synchronization between snow-melt and rains. This happened in 1988.

2. Unusually high rainfall; 1987.

3. Flash floods.

4. Storm surges, cyclones; 1991.

Myth: Himalayan degradation. The common cause of floods projected in the mass media is that deforestation in the Himalayas is the main culprit. There is very little empirical support for this view, and it is probably completely untrue. Most of the research has shown that Himalayan deforestation has very little impact on Bangladesh.

See the link for the full article

http://members.tripod.com/~SOUTH_ASIA_FORUM/floods...

easy answer - too much water!