MUMBAI: The death toll from flooding and landslides triggered by heavy monsoon rains in India climbed to 124 Sunday, officials said, with rescuers searching for dozens more missing.
The country’s western coast has been inundated by torrential rains since Thursday, with the India Meteorological Department warning of further downpours over the next few days.
In Maharasthra state, 114 people have been killed, including more than 40 in a large landslide that hit the hillside village of Taliye, south of Mumbai, on Thursday.
Villager Jayram Mahaske, whose relatives remained trapped, told AFP that “many people were washed away as they were trying to run away” when the landslide hit.
It flattened dozens of homes in a matter of minutes, leaving just two concrete structures standing and cutting off power supply, local residents told AFP.
Rescuers were scouring the mud and debris for 99 others still missing.
“My entire team is engaged in rescue operations now,” National Disaster Response Force Inspector Rajesh Yawale, who was coordinating rescue operations in the village, told AFP Saturday.
He said many bodies were washed away, with some found stuck among trees downstream.
A dozen others were killed in two separate landslides, also south of Mumbai.
In parts of Chiplun, water levels rose to nearly 20 feet (six meters) on Thursday after 24 hours of uninterrupted rain submerged roads and homes.
Eight patients at a local Covid-19 hospital also reportedly died after power supply to ventilators was cut off by the floods.
In neighboring Goa, a woman drowned, the state government told the Press Trust of India, in what Chief Minister Pramod Sawant said were the “worst floods since 1982.”
In the coastal plains spanning Maharashtra and Goa, floodwater levels remained elevated after rivers burst their banks.
Terrified residents climbed onto rooftops and upper floors to escape swelling waters.
Further south in Karnataka state, the death toll rose from three to nine overnight, with four others missing, officials said.
Power supply was disrupted in the 11 affected districts and officials added that there were crop losses across vast swathes of land.
Flooding and landslides are common during India’s treacherous monsoon season, which also often sees poorly constructed buildings buckle after days of non-stop rain.
Four people died before dawn on Friday when a building collapsed in a Mumbai slum, authorities said.
The incident came less than a week after at least 34 people lost their lives when several homes were crushed by a collapsed wall and a landslide in the city.
India monsoon death toll climbs to 124 as rescuers search for missing
India monsoon death toll climbs to 124 as rescuers search for missing
South Africa declares national disaster as floods batter region
- Authorities continued to search for survivors and recover bodies at the weekend, but flooding had started receding in some areas
- Rivers burst their banks and swallowed entire neighborhoods in several regions of Mozambique
JOHANNESBURG: South Africa on Sunday declared a national disaster after widespread flooding that destroyed homes and killed dozens, while thousands sought shelter in neighboring Mozambique.
Heavy rains and storms have battered the two southern African countries for weeks, claiming more than 30 lives in South Africa’s northeastern Limpopo and Mpumalanga provinces.
Rivers burst their banks and swallowed entire neighborhoods in several regions of Mozambique, displacing thousands including a woman who was forced to give birth on a roof as she sheltered from flood waters.
“I classify the disaster as a national disaster,” the head of South Africa’s National Disaster Management Center Elias Sithole said in a statement Sunday.
Authorities continued to search for survivors and recover bodies at the weekend, but flooding had started receding in some areas, including the famed Kruger National Park, which had been forced to close and evacuate guests Thursday.
“Day visitation to the park will resume as of tomorrow,” South African National Parks announced on social media, still urging visitors to “exercise caution.”
- Baby born on a roof -
In Mozambique, rescue efforts were slow to reach survivors who sheltered on roofs and in trees.
At least eight people had died in the country since December 21, according to official data, but numbers were expected to rise as more people were declared missing.
A resident of Gaza province north of Maputo, Chauna Macuacua, told AFP that her sister-in-law had given birth on a roof where the family was waiting to be rescued since Thursday.
“We’ve been here for 4 days. My nephew was born yesterday around 11 PM (2100 GMT), and we still haven’t had any rescue or assistance for the baby and mother,” she said.
Wilker Dias, the director of a civil society group called Plataforma Decide, said he had received reports of several people missing.
“I think the numbers of dead will increase in the next hours,” he told AFP.
South Africa also dispatched rescue teams to southern Mozambique Sunday after a car carrying five members of a South African mayoral delegation was swept away by floodwaters in Chokwe, 200 kilometers (124 miles) north of Maputo.
According to the latest figures released by the Mozambican government on Friday, more than 173,000 people had been affected by the floods across the country.
