Cyclone Nargis Cyclone Nargis posed 48 hours before it hit the country's coast. Relief efforts were slowed for political reasons as Myanmar's military rulers initially resisted large-scale international aid. US President George W. Bush said that an angry world should condemn the way Myanmar's military rulers were handling the aftermath of such a catastrophic cyclone. Myanmar's military junta finally accepted aid a few days after India's request was accepted. Hampering the relief efforts, only ten days after the cyclone, nearby central China was hit by a massive earthquake, known as the Sichuan earthquake which measured 7.9 in magnitude and it alone had
Cyclone Nargis of 160 km/h (100 mph), and at the same time, the IMD classified the system as a very severe cyclonic storm. Initially, the cyclone was forecast to strike Bangladesh or southeastern India. Subsequently, the cyclone became disorganised and weakened due to subsidence and drier air; as a result, deep convection near the center markedly decreased. At the same time, the storm began a motion to the northeast, around the periphery of a ridge to its southeast. The circulation remained strong despite the diminishing convection, though satellite intensity estimates using the Dvorak technique indicated the cyclone could have weakened to tropical