Flash Flood Sweeps Campsite in North China, Leaving 8 Dead and 4 Missing
Saturday's flood occurred around 10 p.m. local time in Urad Rear Banner, an expansive mountainous area in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous region known for its popular campsites.
Thirteen campers went missing initially. By Sunday morning, one had been rescued and eight bodies had been found, according to the official Xinhua news agency.
Search and rescue efforts were underway for the remaining four missing people.
Northern China has seen several instances of flash flooding and landslides in recent weeks. Deluges in the northwestern Gansu province earlier this month left at least 10 people dead and 33 missing.
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Arab News
an hour ago
- Arab News
Pakistan rains kill nearly 670 since June as authorities warn of more monsoon spells
ISLAMABAD: Torrential monsoon rains and subsequent floods have killed almost 670 people in Pakistan since late June, with the disaster management authority warning on Monday that at least two more heavy spells are expected before the season tapers off in September. Heavy rain in Pakistan's northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province halted rescue and relief operations for several hours on Monday before resuming in a region where flash floods have killed over 300 people since Friday. Officials fear the toll, already among the deadliest in recent years, could rise further as dozens remain missing. 'We are going through the seventh spell of monsoon of 2025,' National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) Chairman Lt. Gen. Inam Haider Malik told a press briefing. 'The predictions that we made about the monsoon from June to September, there will be at least 9 to 10 spells, which will impact different areas of Pakistan.' He said approximately 670 people had died and about 1,000 had been injured since the monsoons began in the last week of June. Up to 90 people were also still missing. Malik cautioned that the situation could intensify, with cloudbursts and localized rains forecast from Aug. 23 through early September. 'If horizontal flows mix with vertical flows, this can be a more dangerous situation, which we have seen in 2022,' he said, referring to devastating rains and floods that killed over 1,700 people and caused over $30 billion in losses three years ago. The NDMA chief explained that 'horizontal flows' caused by rapidly melting glaciers in the northern Gilgit-Baltistan, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Azad Jammu and Kashmir regions had already destroyed bridges and other infrastructure. Vertical flows, he said, came in the form of cloudbursts and prolonged rains. 'When these flows converge, they trigger serious emergencies,' Malik said. He said 425 relief camps had been activated and convoys of trucks carrying food were being dispatched to badly hit districts in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, including Buner. The Pakistan Army had deployed engineers and special units for search and rescue, while field hospitals and Combined Military Hospitals were on alert to treat the injured. 'By September 10, we will have comprehensive national data on casualties and damages,' Malik said. Separately, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, who chaired a high-level meeting in Islamabad, announced that the federal cabinet would donate one month's salary to flood victims in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. 'This is not the time for politics, it is the time for service and to heal people's wounds,' Sharif said, according to an official statement. He directed federal ministers to personally oversee the restoration of electricity, roads, water and other infrastructure in the affected regions. The Minister for Kashmir Affairs was tasked to supervise distribution of relief goods, while the finance ministry was instructed to provide NDMA with additional resources. 'Until the last affected person is helped and basic infrastructure is restored, the relevant federal ministers will remain in the field,' the statement quoted Sharif as saying. The PMO said 456 relief camps had been set up nationwide and more than 400 rescue operations conducted so far, with losses to public and private property estimated at Rs126 million ($455,000). Aid distribution under the Prime Minister's relief package, alongside medical teams and medicines, was ongoing, it added. BUNER Buner district in KP province has been the worst hit in the latest rains that began on Friday, with over 200 deaths. Heavy rain in the flood-hit areas, including Buner, forced rescue teams to halt relief efforts for several hours on Monday, a regional government officer, Abid Wazir, told Reuters. 'Our priority is now to clear the roads, set up bridges and bring relief to the affected people,' he said. Residents in Buner's Bayshonai Kalay village panicked and ran to higher ground after a water channel that had earlier overflowed and caused major devastation started swelling with the fresh rain on Monday, according to Reuters witnesses. Rescuers from local government, the disaster management authority and the army used excavator machines to clear the roads and streets from mud, fallen trees and electric poles. Relief goods have been sent to the affected areas, Information Minister Attaullah Tarar said in a recorded video statement on Monday. Food, medicine, blankets, camps, an electric generator and de-watering pumps are included in the relief goods, the authority said in a statement. Buner, a three-and-a-half-hour drive from the capital Islamabad, was hit by a cloudburst, a rare phenomenon in which more than 100 mm (4 inches) of rain falls within an hour in a small area, officials said. In Buner, there was more than 150 mm of rain within an hour on Friday morning, they said. More heavy rain was expected across Pakistan until early September, officials said. 'The current weather system is active over the Pakistan region and may cause heavy to very heavy rainfall during the next 24 hours,' the disaster management authority said on Sunday. With inputs from Reuters
Arab News
a day ago
- Arab News
Pakistan defends flood response after over 270 people killed in northwestern district
BUNER, Pakistan: Torrential rains triggered more flash floods in two villages in the Kathua district of Indian-controlled Kashmir, killing at least seven people and injuring five others overnight, officials said Sunday. In Kishtwar district, teams are continuing their efforts in the remote village of Chositi, looking for dozens of missing people after the area was hit by flash floods last week. At least 60 were killed and some 150 injured, about 50 of them critically. In Pakistan, authorities on Sunday defended their response to climate-induced flash floods that killed more than 270 people in a single northwestern district. Mohammad Suhail, a spokesman for the emergency service, said 54 bodies were found after hours-long efforts in Buner, a mountainous district in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, where torrential rains and cloudbursts triggered massive flooding on Friday. Similar cloudburst have also caused devastations in the Indian-administered Kashmir. Suhail said several villagers remain missing, and search efforts are focused on areas where homes were flattened by torrents of water that swept down from the mountains, carrying massive boulders that smashed into houses like explosions. Authorities have warned of more deluges and possible landslides between now and Tuesday, urging local administrations to remain on alert. Higher-than-normal monsoon rains have lashed the country since June 26 and killed more than 600. More intense weather to come? Residents in Buner have accused officials of failing to warn them to evacuate after torrential rain and cloudbursts triggered deadly flooding and landslides. There was no warning broadcast from mosque loudspeakers, a traditional method in remote areas. The government said that while an early warning system was in place, the sudden downpour in Buner was so intense that the deluge struck before residents could be alerted. Lt. Gen. Inam Haider, chairman of the National Disaster Management Authority, told a hastily convened news conference in Islamabad that Pakistan was experiencing shifting weather patterns because of climate change. Since the monsoon season began in June, Pakistan has already received 50 percent more rainfall than in the same period last year, he added. He warned that more intense weather could follow, with heavy rains forecast to continue this month. Asfandyar Khan Khattak, director-general of the Provincial Disaster Management Authority, said there was 'no forecasting system anywhere in the world' that could predict the exact time and location of a cloudburst. Mohammad Iqbal, a schoolteacher in Pir Baba village, said the lack of a timely warning system caused casualties and forced many to flee their homes at the last moment. 'Survivors escaped with nothing,' he said. 'If people had been informed earlier, lives could have been saved and residents could have moved to safer places.' People still missing Idrees Mahsud, a disaster management official, said Pakistan's early warning system used satellite imagery and meteorological data to send alerts to local authorities. These were shared through the media and community leaders. He said monsoon rains that once only swelled rivers now also triggered urban flooding. An emergency services spokesman in Buner, Mohammad Sohail, said more than half the damaged roads in the district had reopened by Sunday, allowing vehicles and heavy machinery to reach cut-off villages. Crews were clearing piles of rocks and mud dumped by the floods. They were still using heavy machinery to remove the rubble of collapsed homes after families reported that some of their relatives were missing. In one of the deadliest incidents, 24 people from one family died in the village of Qadar Nagar when floodwaters swept through their home on the eve of a wedding. The head of the family, Umar Khan, said he survived the floods because he was out of the house at the time. Four of his relatives have yet to be found, he added. Extreme weather events Pakistan is highly vulnerable to climate-induced disasters. In 2022, a record-breaking monsoon killed nearly 1,700 people and destroyed millions of homes. The country also suffers regular flash floods and landslides during the monsoon season, which runs from June to September, particularly in the rugged northwest, where villages are often perched on steep slopes and riverbanks. Experts say climate change is intensifying the frequency and severity of such extreme weather events in South Asia. Khalid Khan, a weather expert, said Pakistan produces less than 1 percent of planet-warming emissions but faces heatwaves, heavy rains, glacial outburst floods and now cloudbursts, underscoring how climate change is devastating communities within hours. Thursday's floods struck during an annual Hindu pilgrimage. Authorities rescued over 300 people, while some 4,000 pilgrims were evacuated to safety.
Arab News
a day ago
- Arab News
Pakistan to compensate survivors for losses after floods kill 312 in northwest since Aug. 15
ISLAMABAD: The government in Pakistan's northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province will compensate survivors of this week's deadly floods, Chief Minister Ali Amin Gandapur announced on Sunday, urging residents of disaster-prone areas to relocate from there. Monsoon rains have wreaked havoc in Pakistan's northern areas, especially its Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province, where floods and landslides have killed over 312 people since Aug. 15, according to the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA). The cumulative death toll from rain-related incidents in Pakistan, which ranks among the countries most vulnerable to climate change, has surged to 645 since Jun. 26. Apart from KP, 164 deaths have been reported in Punjab, 29 in Balochistan, 14 in Azad Kashmir, eight in Islamabad, and 28 each in Gilgit-Baltistan and Sindh. Raging hill torrents flattened several homes and swept away dozens of people and in KP's Swat, Buner, Bajaur, Torghar, Mansehra, Shangla and Battagram districts on Friday. Officials says around 54 bodies were found on Sunday in the worst-hit Buner district where cloudbursts triggered massive flooding. 'The data of all the losses is being compiled,' CM Gandapur told reporters in Buner. 'It is beyond our power to compensate the loss of lives, but we will compensate financial losses, damages to private property.' Residents in Buner have accused officials of failing to warn them to evacuate after torrential rain and cloudbursts triggered deadly flooding and landslides. Mohammad Iqbal, a schoolteacher in Pir Baba village, said the lack of a timely warning system caused casualties and forced many to flee their homes at the last moment. 'Survivors escaped with nothing,' he said. 'If people had been informed earlier, lives could have been saved and residents could have moved to safer places.' The government said that while an early warning system was in place, the sudden downpour in Buner was so intense that the deluge struck before residents could be alerted. Asfandyar Khan Khattak, director-general of the Provincial Disaster Management Authority, said there was 'no forecasting system anywhere in the world' that could predict the exact time and location of a cloudburst. Several people are still missing and search efforts are focused on areas where homes were flattened by water torrents that swept down from the mountains, carrying massive boulders that smashed into houses like explosions. Authorities have warned of more deluges and possible landslides till Tuesday. Speaking to reporters, CM Gandapur vowed the government infrastructure relating to health, water, road or education would be fully restored. He, however, noted that some of the villages were located in such areas where any calamities like cloudbursts and floods could hit any time. 'So, we want to resettle residents of those small villages at another place and we will build houses for them, but they should evacuate these dangerous areas,' Gandapur said.
