Pakistan races to save millions from floods

Islamabad: First responders in southern Pakistan are scrambling to evacuate millions of people from remote villages as the region nervously awaited the arrival of rainwater flowing from the country’s north, officials said.

According to the German press agency (dpa), the rescue efforts in the province of Sindh, which has been the worst hit province in a series of floods that have occurred since mid-June, were being supported by military helicopters and boats, a provincial government spokesperson Murtaza Wahab said. Pakistan floods millions of evacuation

It is a race against time, said Wahab, who was overseeing the evacuation. Pakistan floods millions of evacuation

Pakistan’s River Indus, which flows from the Himalayas to the Arabian Sea in the south, has once again burst its banks following heavy rains in the mountains last week.

Almost 20,000 cubic metres of water per second is now flowing downstream and will shortly reach major cities in Sindh, the disaster management agency said.

The death toll from the flooding has already reached 1,208 and was expected to rise, the agency said.

A total of 399 children and 246 women lost their lives while 3,641 people were wounded since mid-June, according to the country’s National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA).

Over 33 million Pakistanis in 80 districts across the country have been affected by the ongoing rainfall and floods, the NDMA said.

Constant rains and raging floods have already destroyed a large chunk of infrastructure and agricultural lands across the country, including tens of thousands of houses, roads, and bridges, and washed away nearly a million animals.

According to the NDMA, so far 468,030 people have been shifted to the shelter camps and 118,247 people were evacuated from most affected areas.

The heavy floods also damaged over 1.1 million houses, while 372,823 houses were completely destroyed. Some 731,818 animals also perished.

WAM