Flash flood kills more in storm-hit Pakistan
Pastor Dale Morgan
Sunday July 1, 8:51 PM Reuters
*Flash flood kills more in storm-hit Pakistan*
By Gul Yusafzai
QUETTA, Pakistan (Reuters) - A flash flood swept through six villages in
Pakistan's storm-hit Baluchistan province killing 30 people and forcing
more than 10,000 from their homes as a huge effort to help up to 1.5
million people geared up.
Early rainy season storms have brought death and destruction to parts of
Pakistan, Afghanistan and India killing about 600 people over the past
10 days.
Pakistan has been worst hit. A storm battered the nation's biggest city,
Karachi, on June 23 killing about 230 people.
Three days later, a cyclone hit the southwest coast flooding huge tracts
of mostly flat, usually desert-like, Baluchistan province.
The cyclone and floods have affected between 1.2 million and 1.5
million, deputy provincial relief commissioner Ali Gul Kurd said on
Sunday. About 250,000 people are homeless.
Persistent rain has aggravated the flooding and caused flash floods like
the one that swept away the villages in Khuzdar district on Saturday.
"We've managed to find 30 bodies so far but we don't even know how many
people are missing," Kurd said.
"Everything is being done haphazardly."
The military is helping organise rescue and relief efforts with six
C-130 cargo aircraft and more than two dozen helicopters carrying out
search and rescue and relief operations.
Aid is being taken by rail to the town of Sibi and distributed from
there while the coastal belt is being supplied by sea.
Camps for the homeless were being set up but in the meantime people were
crowding into schools. "Most of the displaced have been moved to schools
but there aren't enough," Kurd said.
Flooding has also increased the danger of snakes and at least three
people had been bitten in one district. Authorities were desperate for
antivenom, aid workers said. Health secretary Shafi Zehri said supplies
were being distributed.
BAD WEATHER
Sunday was generally clear but the Meteorological Department said more
rain was on the way, especially for Sindh province, of which Karachi is
capital.
Floods inundated about 40 hamlets in northern Sindh on Sunday, affecting
60,000 people, said a provincial official.
In the Khyber Pass area, in North West Frontier Province on the border
with Afghanistan, about 50 people have been killed as rivers swollen by
torrential rain burst their banks.
In Afghanistan, NATO peacekeepers have been helping after floods killed
more than 40 people, destroyed roads and damaged homes and irrigation works.
In India, about 180 people have been killed in storms and floods over
the past 10 days.
In the western state of Maharashtra, at least eight people were killed
in Saturday night storms.
In Mumbai, India's financial hub and Maharashtra's capital, rescue
workers used rubber boats to ferry people to safety.
"We've deployed all our resources to tackle the situation but the amount
of rain has been much higher than the capacity of the drainage system,"
said Mumbai's civic chief Jairaj Pathak.
Suburban trains -- Mumbai's lifeline -- were running late, but air
services were near normal.
Storms have also menaced India's Bay of Bengal coast.
The seasonal rain is vital for the region's agriculture and economy. It
also brings welcome relief after many hot, dry months but every year the
rains kill hundreds of people.
(Additional reporting by Kamran Haider in ISLAMABAD, Krittivas Mukherjee
in MUMBAI, a Reuters reporter in HYDERABAD, India and
Hamid Sheikh in HYDERABAD, Pakistan)