About 100 people missing as flash flood tears through town in northern India | India
A mud torrent of a sudden flood broke a city in the Himalayan region in India, demolish a mountain valley before demolishing buildings and killing at least four people, with around 100 other disappeared.
Videos broadcast on the Indian media have shown a terrifying increase in muddy water sweeping apartments in the Dharali tourist region in the state of Uttarakhand.
Several people could be seen to run before being swallowed up by the dark waves of debris which uprooted the buildings.
Indian Minister of Defense, Sanjay Seth, told the press agency Press Trust of India: “This is a serious situation … We have received information on four deaths and approximately 100 disappeared. We pray for their safety. “
Uttarakhand’s chief minister in the state of the Uttarakhand Singh Dhami said that rescue teams had been deployed “on a war base”.
A high local official, Prashant Arya, said that four people had been killed, other officials saying that the number could increase.
The army of India said that 150 soldiers had reached the city, helping to save around twenty people who had survived the wall of icy sludge. “A layer of massive mud struck Dharali … triggering a sudden flow of debris and water through the colony,” said the army.
The images published by the army, taken from the site after the passage of the main torrent, showed a slow mud river.
A city band was overwhelmed by deep debris. In places, the mud launched the houses of houses.
“Research and rescue efforts are underway, all the available resources being deployed to locate and evacuate all remaining blocked people,” said an army spokesperson Suneel Bartwal.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi expressed his condolences and said that “no stone has not returned to provide assistance”.
Dhami said the flood was caused by a sudden and intense “cloudburst”, describing the destruction of “extremely sad and painful”.
The Meteorological Service of India issued a red warning warning for the region, saying that it had recorded “extremely heavy” precipitation of around 21 cm (8 inch) in isolated parts of Uttarakhand.
Mortal floods and landslides are common during the monsoon season from June to September, but experts claim that the climate crisis, associated with urbanization, increases their frequency and severity.
The United Nations World Meteorological Organization said last year that more intense floods and droughts are a “distress signal” for what will happen when the climate rupture makes the water cycle of the planet more and more unpredictable.
