Da Nang: Keeping An Luong embankment safe

Uncertainty, anxiety, insomnia… are the common feelings of hundreds of households in the An Luong embankment area (Duy Nghia commune, Da Nang city) in recent days when seeing the embankment destroyed by floodwaters. The concrete embankment combined with the riverside road where people moored boats and traded seafood is now gone. Never before have the people of An Luong felt so insecure, but never before have the people here been so united.

Báo Tin Tức•20/11/2025

Join hands to reclaim every inch of land

Photo caption — Armed forces and people urgently packed sandbags to reinforce An Luong embankment. Photo: Anh Dung/VNA

About 1 km from the An Luong embankment is where people gather to scoop sand, put it in bags to transport to reinforce the embankment. Here, hundreds of people, young and old, men and women, are urgently coordinating with the military forces to scoop sand. With only shovels, sacks and human strength, a sand hill dozens of meters high has been scooped away more than half to build a breakwater.

Despite his small and skinny figure compared to his 13 years old, Nguyen Minh Tri is one of the enthusiastic members of the team that shovels soil and sand into sacks and transports them to the An Luong embankment. Alongside Tri is a “little squad” of 7 children of the same age, every 2 children carry a bag of sand, happily contributing their small part to the adults’ disaster prevention work.

“My house is not near the embankment, but when we heard about the embankment eroding, my whole family volunteered to join hands and contribute to reinforcing the embankment. I cannot do heavy and dangerous work on the embankment, so I am here to help the uncles and aunts scoop sand, tie sandbags and load them onto the truck to the gathering point. I hope the rain will stop so the embankment will not continue to eroding,” said Nguyen Minh Tri.

Hundreds of women also took advantage of every day, every hour to support the reinforcement of An Luong embankment. They were divided into many groups, some prepared sacks, some tied ropes, some supplied food and water... No one told anyone, everyone just focused on doing their tasks well and quickly. Among them, there were teachers who volunteered to participate in community work right after finishing their shift.

Ms. Nguyen Thi Hue, an English teacher at Duy Nghia Primary School No. 3, shared that although women do not have enough strength to lift sandbags or do heavy work, they still want to contribute their small strength to support the forces to maintain the embankment. Seeing the military, government and local people making great efforts in the past days, we are more deeply imbued with the close neighborly love and affection between the Vietnamese people and the army in times of trouble.

Nearby, Huynh Nhu Thao, Vice Principal of Duy Nghia Primary School No. 3, was also busy shoveling sand with the teachers. Ms. Thao said that the teaching schedule was almost full all week, so the teachers did not have much free time. As soon as class ended, the teachers took advantage of the opportunity to invite each other to support the people. When she arrived, she was happy to see that many students were also actively participating in volunteering. This is extremely valuable, showing that from a young age, the students have been responsible for the community, and when they grow up, they will help build a prosperous and humane Vietnam.

Like in wartime, women and children here have become a solid "rear" to provide sandbags for the "frontline" forces to build embankments, prevent floods, and fight to regain every inch of land from natural disasters.

Keep the embankment, keep the peace for the fishing village

An Luong fishing village is located at the mouth of the Thu Bon River. Right on the An Luong embankment, there is a famous fish market, specializing in providing fresh seafood for Hoi An city and the surrounding area. But now the concrete embankment has been washed away by the water, the asphalt road above has also been half "swallowed" by the waves, the landslide is only about 3 meters from the houses. Losing the embankment means losing the livelihood, taking with it the houses, markets, and properties of hundreds of households...

These days, An Luong market is deserted, with no customers. Mrs. Phung Thi Bon (56 years old, a vendor at An Luong market) said while cleaning up her stall: “Every night I can’t sleep because I hear the sound of waves, afraid that the embankment will collapse and the market will come, not knowing how to do business. In the past few days, the market has had no customers because the embankment has collapsed. I hope that after this flood, the government will rebuild a new embankment so that people can continue to stabilize their business and live.”

As for Mr. Le Van Mot (a resident of An Luong village), he has no time to worry because every day he is busy carrying sand and building dikes with the forces. Born and raised in An Luong village, it has been more than 50 years, but he has never seen such a terrible flood, causing such great damage as this time.

The floodwaters flowed rapidly, washing away all the soil under the foot of the embankment, causing the embankment to gradually break down from the foundation up. Therefore, we had to weave wire mesh baskets, put sandbags in them and then place them deep down to reinforce the foundation. Later, if the city rebuilds a new embankment, it is recommended that concrete piles be installed to reinforce the embankment foundation to prevent floodwaters - Mr. Mot suggested.

Ngày 13/11 vừa qua, Chủ tịch UBND thành phố Đà Nẵng Phạm Đức Ấn đã công bố tình huống khẩn cấp về thiên tai đối với tình hình sạt lở tại bờ kè An Lương; giao Chủ tịch UBND xã Duy Nghĩa tiếp tục triển khai thực hiện các biện pháp khẩn cấp để ứng phó và khắc phục hậu quả nhằm ngăn chặn, hạn chế đến mức thấp nhất thiệt hại do thiên tai gây ra.

According to Mr. Pham Duoc, Chairman of Duy Nghia Commune People's Committee, over the past 20 days, thousands of people and local government forces, police and military have joined hands to build a temporary dike to preserve An Luong embankment. However, the embankment has been severely damaged, the roadbed has collapsed into the river, so the dike solution is only temporary and ineffective.

Hiện địa phương đang đề xuất thành phố xây dựng mới toàn bộ bờ kè và trục đường ven sông dài khoảng 2,2 km để đảm bảo an toàn cho các hộ dân và phát triển kinh tế khu vực…

Source: https://baotintuc.vn/xa-hoi/da-nang-giu-an-yen-cho-bo-ke-an-luong-20251120124847741.htm