As more floods batter Bangladesh and India, death toll rises to 30

DHAKA, Bangladesh (AP) — Floods wreaked more havoc in India’s northeast and neighboring Bangladesh’s eastern region, raising this week’s total death toll to 30, officials and media reports said Friday.

Rain stopped in many parts of Bangladesh on Friday and weather officials in Dhaka said the waters had started receding in some areas, but said the flooding would not be over for days.

In India's Tripura state, eight more people died in the last 24 hours, raising the death toll to 19 since Monday, said a state disaster management official on condition of anonymity as he was not authorized to speak to the media. Earlier, 11 people were reported dead.

In Bangladesh, seven more people died in the last 24 hours, Dhaka-based Ekhon TV reported Friday. Earlier, four deaths were reported in raging waters flooding downstream from India, and amid incessant rains in the country’s eastern region.

Bangladeshi non-government organization BRAC said in a statement that up to 3 million people remained stranded as fast-moving water inundated vast areas of farmland, destroying livelihoods, homes, and crops. It said many remained without electricity, food or water. Other media reports said up to 4.5 million people have been affected in the delta nation of 170 million people.

A number of charity groups have called for help, with a student group collecting dry food, cash, water and medicines at Dhaka University in the nation’s capital.

In the Indian state of Tripura, authorities said around 100,000 people took shelter in over 400 relief camps, as the floods affected 1.7 million people in eight districts of the state. Chief Minister Manik Saha undertook an aerial survey to assess the situation.

Liakath Ali, BRAC’s director of Climate Change, Urban Development and Disaster Risk Management, said that these were the worst floods Bangladesh has seen in three decades.

“Entire villages, all of the families who lived in them, and everything they owned — homes, livestock, farmlands, fisheries — have been washed away. People had no time to save anything. There are people stranded across the country, and we are expecting the situation to worsen in many places as rains continue,” he said.

New breaches on a flood protection embankment in the Gomti River in the eastern district of Cumilla inundated about 100 low-lying villages from Thursday midnight, Dhaka-based The Business Standard newspaper reported Friday. Other districts including Noakhali, Feni and Chattogram were also hard hit.

Volunteers at the scene at Cumilla attempted to alert people to move to safety after the breaches on Thursday midnight, while residents used loudspeakers at neighborhood mosques to relay warnings.

Some victims in the area told television stations that they had left their belongings behind and rushed to higher ground for safety.

Abed Ali, a senior relief official in Cumilla district, told The Associated Press by phone that residents have been asked to move to shelters, but are facing difficulties reaching them in current conditions.

The military used helicopters to ferry relief materials and dry food to affected people on Friday, according to posts on its Facebook page.

In Bangladesh, rumors spread online that the flooding was caused by India opening the Dumbur dam in Tripura, causing a number of anti-India protests. India’s External Affairs Ministry denied the connection, pointing out that the dam is far from the border and that heavy rains had caused major flooding over a wide area in both countries.

AP writer Wasbir Hussain contributed to the report from Guawhati, India.

People carry their belongings and wade through flooded water to reach a temporary shelter in Feni, a coastal district in southeast Bangladesh, Friday, Aug. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Fatima Tuj Johora)

Bangladesh army soldiers distribute relief material to the flooded areas in Feni, in south-eastern Bangladesh, Friday, Aug. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Fatima Tuj Johora)

Volunteers carry relief material to the flooded areas in Feni, in south-eastern Bangladesh, Friday, Aug. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Fatima Tuj Johora)

People bring a speed boat to rescue stranded residents in a flooded area of Feni, a coastal district in southeast Bangladesh, Friday, Aug. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Fatima Tuj Johora)

People carry their belongings and wade through flooded water to reach a temporary shelter in Feni, a coastal district in southeast Bangladesh, Friday, Aug. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Fatima Tuj Johora)

A boy carries his belongings to a temporary shelter through a flooded street in Feni, a coastal district in southeast Bangladesh, Friday, Aug. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Fatima Tuj Johora)

People carry their belongings and wade through flooded water to reach a temporary shelter in Feni, a coastal district in southeast Bangladesh, Friday, Aug. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Fatima Tuj Johora)

Volunteers rescue a ten-day-old child and her mother from flooded areas in Feni, a coastal district in southeast Bangladesh, Friday, Aug. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Fatima Tuj Johora)

A Bangladeshi army soldier watches as people carrying their belongings wade through flooded water to reach a relief center in Feni, a coastal district in southeast Bangladesh, Friday, Aug. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Fatima Tuj Johora)

People displaced by floods rest at a relief shelter in Mohipal, Feni, a coastal district in southeast Bangladesh, Friday, Aug. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Fatima Tuj Johora)

People displaced by floods rest at a relief shelter in Mohipal, Feni, a coastal district in southeast Bangladesh, Friday, Aug. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Fatima Tuj Johora)

People displaced by floods rest at a relief shelter in Mohipal, Feni, a coastal district in southeast Bangladesh, Friday, Aug. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Fatima Tuj Johora)

A man walks with belongings to a relief shelter through a flooded street following heavy rains in Mohipal, Feni, a coastal district in southeast Bangladesh, Friday, Aug. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Fatima Tuj Johora)

People displaced by floods rest at a relief shelter in Mohipal, Feni, a coastal district in southeast Bangladesh, Friday, Aug. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Fatima Tuj Johora)

A young child reacts to the camera at a relief shelter for people displaced by floods in Mohipal, Feni, a coastal district in southeast Bangladesh, Friday, Aug. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Fatima Tuj Johora)

Bangladesh army personnel rescue people in a boat after heavy rains caused large areas to be flooded in Mohipal, Feni, a coastal district in southeast Bangladesh, Friday, Aug. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Fatima Tuj Johora)

People walk to a relief shelter with their belongings through a flooded street in Mohipal, Feni, a coastal district in southeast Bangladesh, Friday, Aug. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Fatima Tuj Johora)

In this photo made available by the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF), NDRF personnel transport people to safety through a flooded area following incessant rains on the outskirts of Agartala, north eastern Tripura state, India, Thursday, Aug. 22, 2024.(National Disaster Response Force via AP)

In this photo made available by the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF), an NDRF person carries an infant to safety in a flood-affected area on the outskirts of Agartala, north eastern Tripura state, India, Thursday, Aug. 22, 2024. (National Disaster Response Force via AP)

People walk to a relief shelter with belongings through a flooded street following heavy rains in Mohipal, Feni, a coastal district in southeast Bangladesh, Friday, Aug. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Fatima Tuj Johora)

Volunteers use a boat to help rescue people on a flooded street following heavy rains in Mohipal, Feni, a coastal district in southeast Bangladesh, Friday, Aug. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Fatima Tuj Johora)

BOSTON (AP) — A study that explores the feasibility of using pigeons to guide missiles and one that looks at the swimming abilities of dead fish were among the winners Thursday of this year’s Ig Nobels, the prize for comical scientific achievement.

Held less than a month before the actual Nobel Prizes are announced, the 34th annual Ig Nobel prize ceremony at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology was organized by the Annals of Improbable Research magazine’s website to make people laugh and think. Winners received a transparent box containing historic items related to Murphy’s Law — the theme of the night — and a nearly worthless Zimbabwean $10 trillion bill. Actual Nobel laureates handed the winners their prizes.

“While some politicians were trying to make sensible things sound crazy, scientists discovered some crazy-sounding things that make a lot of sense,” Marc Abrahams, master of ceremonies and editor of the magazine, said in an e-mail interview.

The ceremony started with Kees Moliker, winner of 2003 Ig Noble for biology, giving out safety instructions. His prize was for a study that documented the existence of homosexual necrophilia in mallard ducks.

“This is the duck,” he said, holding up a duck. “This is the dead one.”

After that, someone came on stage wearing a yellow target on their chest and a plastic face mask. Soon, they were inundated with people in the audience throwing paper airplanes at them.

Then, the awards began — several dry presentations which were interrupted by a girl coming on stage and repeatedly yelling “Please stop. I'm bored.” The awards ceremony was also was broken up by an international song competition inspired by Murphy's Law, including one about coleslaw and another about the legal system.

The winners were honored in 10 categories, including for peace and anatomy. Among them were scientists who showed a vine from Chile imitates the shapes of artificial plants nearby and another study that examined whether the hair on people's heads in the Northern Hemisphere swirled in the same direction as someone's hair in the Southern Hemisphere.

Other winners include a group of scientists who showed that fake medicine that causes side effects can be more effective than fake medicine that doesn't cause side effects and one showing that some mammals are cable of breathing through their anus — winners who came on stage wearing a fish-inspired hats.

Julie Skinner Vargas accepted the peace prize on behalf of her late father B.F. Skinner, who wrote the pigeon-missile study. Skinner Vargas is also the head of the B.F. Skinner Foundation.

“I want to thank you for finally acknowledging his most important contribution,” she said. “Thank you for putting the record straight.”

James Liao, a biology professor at the University of Florida, accepted the physics prize for his study demonstrating and explaining the swimming abilities of a dead trout.

“I discovered that a live fish moved more than a dead fish but not by much,” Liao said, holding up a fake fish. “A dead trout towed behind a stick also flaps its tail to the beat of the current like a live fish surfing on swirling eddies, recapturing the energy in its environment. A dead fish does live fish things.”

Professor James Liao displays a stuffed fish while accepting a prize for physics for demonstrating and explaining the swimming abilities of a dead trout during a performance at the Ig Nobel Prize ceremony at Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Mass., Thursday, Sept. 12, 2024. (AP Photo/Steven Senne)

A team of researchers perform a demonstration during a performance showing that many mammals are capable of breathing through their anus while accepting the 2024 Ig Nobel prize in physiology at the Ig Nobel Prize ceremony at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in Cambridge, Mass., Thursday, Sept. 12, 2024. (AP Photo/Steven Senne)

People in the audience throw paper airplanes toward the stage during a performance at the Ig Nobel Prize ceremony at Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Mass., Thursday, Sept. 12, 2024. (AP Photo/Steven Senne)

FILE - Students walk past the "Great Dome" atop Building 10 on the Massachusetts Institute of Technology campus in Cambridge, Mass, April 3, 2017. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa, File)