Pakistani villagers scared to go back to deluged homes after deadly floods
'Everybody is scared. Children are scared. They cannot sleep,' said Sahil Khan, a 24-year-old university student.
He was speaking to a Reuters team from a rooftop in the district of Buner, where he and 15 other villagers had climbed to escape any more flooding amid a fresh spell of rain on Monday.
'It was like a doomsday scenario,' he said of the flash floods caused by heavy rains and cloudbursts that, according to the Provincial Disaster Management Authority, have killed at least 341 people in the northwest since Friday — more than 200 of them in Buner.
The fatalities include 28 women and 21 children, it said.
The intense rain has claimed lives and spread destruction in several northern districts, with most people killed in flash floods, according to the National Disaster Management Authority.
In hilly areas, the floods washed away houses, buildings, vehicles and belongings.
Buner district was the worst hit in northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.
Khan and other residents in Buner's Bayshonai Kalay village fled to higher ground when a water channel that had earlier overflowed and caused major devastation started swelling with more rain on Monday, according to Reuters witnesses.
He and several other residents said most of the villagers were staying with relatives or in makeshift camps set up by local authorities on higher ground.
Rescuers were finding it difficult to get heavy machinery into narrow streets.
In Buner's main markets and streets, shops and houses were buried in up to five feet of mud, which locals were clearing with shovels. Elsewhere, cars and other belongings were strewn in the rubble of ruined buildings.
'People are out of their homes. They are fearful,' said Dayar Khan, 26, a shopkeeper in Buner. 'They have climbed up in the mountains.'
Rescue and relief efforts resumed in the flood-hit areas several hours after heavy rain forced rescuers to halt work 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.
Heavy rains and flash floods also hit more areas in the northwestern province on Monday, including Swabi district, where 11 people were killed, according to the provincial disaster management authority.
The flash floods hit a remote mountainous region in Daroli Bala, local district commissioner Nisar Khan told Reuters, which caused houses to collapse.
It took several hours for rescue teams to access the remote area, he said, adding that he also went to the region where residents reported that their relatives were missing.
'The relatives and family members told us that 40 people have been swept away,' he said.
Lt. Gen. Inam Haider Malik, the National Disaster Management Authority's chairman, warned of two more spells of rain between August 21 and September 10.
'It can intensify,' he said, and there could be more cloudbursts.
Syed Muhammad Tayyab Shah, who leads risk assessment at the authority, said global warming had changed the pattern of the annual monsoon, pushing it around 100 km west of its normal path.
Relief supplies, including food, medicine, blankets, tents, an electric generator and pumps have been sent to the affected areas, the authority said.
Officials said Buner was hit by a cloudburst, a rare phenomenon where more than 100 mm (4 inches) of rain falls within an hour in a small area. In Buner, there was more than 150 mm of rain within an hour on Friday morning.
'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 authority said on Sunday.
Torrential rains and flooding this monsoon season have killed 660 people across Pakistan since late June, it said.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Al Arabiya
5 minutes ago
- Al Arabiya
Deadly monsoon season kills at least 1,860 in India, Pakistan
A deadly monsoon season has claimed at least 1,860 lives in India and Pakistan, with flash floods, landslides and inundated cities exposing the region's growing vulnerability to climate-related disasters. As the monsoon continues, heavy rains have left scenes of devastation across the subcontinent. A sudden downpour in the hilly Indian state of Uttarakhand washed away an entire village this month, while a cloudburst killed around 60 people in Jammu and Kashmir. Life in Mumbai, India's financial hub, came to a standstill this week as roads turned into canals, and in Pakistan, the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province saw 180 deaths in a day. Climate change is intensifying South Asia's monsoon, a seasonal phenomenon that typically brings relief to farmers but increasingly carries severe consequences. Rising global temperatures are ramping up the frequency and intensity of extreme weather events such as floods, droughts, cyclones and heat waves. With weeks of the monsoon season still remaining, the death toll could rise further. Rainfall in the country's northwestern region has been 12 percent above normal so far, and the India Meteorological Department has predicted 'heavy to very heavy' downpours at several locations this week. India has reported 1,109 deaths since late May, while 759 people have died in Pakistan since June 26, according to official figures from the neighboring countries. Many victims drowned, while others perished in landslides or collapsed homes. In India alone, drowning accounted for 484 deaths and floods for 116, the data showed, while 50,000 houses have been damaged, affecting hundreds of thousands people. Inadequate urban planning has compounded the crisis, with authorities struggling every year to manage the situation. Unregulated construction, poor maintenance of sewer systems and swelling populations have left many cities and towns vulnerable to flooding even when rainfall is not extreme, exposing chronic under-preparedness by local authorities. In the five days to Wednesday, the Santacruz weather station in Mumbai recorded 875 millimeters (34.4 inches) of rain, compared with 382 millimeters during the entire month of August last year, according to IMD data. Mumbai is highly prone due to its coastal location. Past disasters, such as the catastrophic floods in 2005 that killed more than 400 people, have shown how fast the city's roads, businesses, and neighborhoods can grind to a halt when heavy precipitation overwhelms drainage systems.
Arab News
7 hours ago
- Arab News
Monsoon floods kill 385 in Pakistan's northwest province, Buner worst-hit district with 228 deaths
ISLAMABAD: Heavy rains, flash floods, landslides and house collapses have killed at least 385 people across Pakistan's northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province since Aug. 15, with Buner district alone accounting for 228 deaths, according to disaster management officials. Flash floods triggered by cloudbursts in the mountainous northwest have brought destruction since Friday in the worst spell of this year's monsoon season, which began in late June. Nationwide, monsoon rains and floods have killed at least 707 people and injured 967 since Jun. 26, according to the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA). Most of the deaths have been caused by flash floods, house collapses, landslides, and electrocutions triggered by heavy rains. 'Administrations of affected districts [in KP] have been directed to accelerate relief activities and provide immediate assistance to victims,' the latest report by the Provincial Disaster Management Authority (PDMA) for KP said. The report added that out of the 385 people killed in the province, 299 were men, 52 women, and 34 children, while 182 people had been injured. A total of 1,398 houses had been damaged due to rains and flash floods since last week, with 1,030 houses partially damaged and 368 completely destroyed. Buner, to the north, received more than 150 mm of rain within an hour triggered by a cloudburst on Friday morning, killing close to 230 people, the single most destructive event in this monsoon season. 'The most affected district is Buner, where the death toll has reached 228, followed by Swabi with 41 fatalities,' the report said. Flood relief operations in places like Khyber Pakhtunkhwa are notoriously difficult because of the province's mountainous terrain, scattered valleys, and fragile road networks that are often the first to be washed away by landslides and flash floods. Many affected villages are accessible only by narrow link roads, suspension bridges, or dirt tracks that become impassable after heavy rain. Limited air support, damaged communications, and the sheer distance between communities slow down rescue efforts, while cultural and security sensitivities in some districts further complicate the ability of aid agencies to respond quickly. Separately, the NDMA issued a travel advisory for northern Pakistan, particularly Gilgit-Baltistan, warning that landslides and flash floods had damaged or blocked several key roads and bridges. Routes between Skardu, Shigar, Kharmang, and Kargil were reported cut off, while access to parts of Hunza, Gilgit, and Astore was disrupted. Authorities said limited traffic was moving on the Jaglot–Skardu road after damage to the Astak Bridge, while other roads including those linking Ghizer, Shandur, Khalkti, Dain, and Ishkoman remained closed. Some access points, including the Sarmo Bridge in Ghanche and Bagheecha Road in Skardu, have since been restored, but NDMA urged travelers to avoid damaged or unsafe routes and follow instructions from local authorities. On Wednesday afternoon, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, accompanied by federal ministers and Army Chief Field Marshal Syed Asim Muneer, visited Swat, Buner, Shangla, and Swabi districts to review the flood situation. According to a report in state-run Associated Press of Pakistan (APP), Sharif said illegal encroachments, the timber mafia, and mining and crushing activities, especially in waterways, had contributed greatly to the loss of lives and damages. Environmental experts have long warned that riverbed mining, unregulated logging, and construction in natural flood channels weaken ecosystems, block drainage routes, and intensify the impact of heavy rains. Since Friday, experts have widely said poor regulation and corruption, as much as extreme weather, were aggravating Pakistan's vulnerability to climate disasters. Annual monsoon rains are vital for agriculture, food security, and the livelihoods of millions of farmers in Pakistan. However, in recent years they have caused intense flooding and landslides amid shifting weather patterns that scientists attribute to global climate change. Pakistan is among the world's most climate-vulnerable nations, despite contributing less than 1 percent to global greenhouse gas emissions. Devastating floods in 2022, triggered by unusually heavy rains and the melting of glaciers, killed over 1,700 people and inflicted losses exceeding $30 billion, according to estimates.
Arab News
12 hours ago
- Arab News
Karachi educational institutions ordered shut as 17 killed amid heavy rains, flooding
KARACHI: All educational institutions in Pakistan's financial hub Karachi will remain closed on Thursday, the Sindh College Education Department said in a notification, as the city reels from heavy monsoon rains and urban flooding. The intense monsoon downpours, which began in Karachi on Tuesday, killed 17 people and submerged major thoroughfares to leave citizens stranded for hours. News outlets reported that several areas of the city remained without power for over 24 hours till Wednesday night. Private weather forecasting company WeatherWalay said the city experienced 'an extraordinary rainfall event' from Aug. 19-20, recording the highest 24-hour precipitation in over four decades when it received between 150-259 millimeters of rainfall across various locations. Karachi Mayor Murtaza Wahab said most of the city's roads, including its major thoroughfares and important underpasses, were cleared for traffic on Wednesday morning. 'All public and private educational institutions within the territorial jurisdiction of Karachi Division under the administrative control of the College Education Department, Government of Sindh shall remain closed on Thursday, 21 August, 2025 due to heavy rains,' the education department's notification said on Wednesday. Karachi, a city of more than 20 million with dilapidated infrastructure, has often seen even moderate rains trigger flooding in parts of the city, threatening residents' lives and causing hours-long power outages. Karachi has faced repeated bouts of urban flooding in recent years. In July-August 2009, the heaviest rains in three decades killed at least 26 people and damaged infrastructure. Torrential downpours in August 2017 left 23 dead and large parts of the city paralyzed, while heavy rains in 2019 killed 11, mostly from electrocution and collapsing structures. The following year brought the worst flooding in nearly a century, with record-breaking rainfall in August 2020 killing more than 40 and cutting power to many neighborhoods for days. In July 2022, intense monsoon showers again submerged parts of the city, killing at least 14 in early July and several more later that month. Karachi has been lashed with heavy rains at a time when Pakistan is witnessing an intense monsoon season that has already ravaged several areas, particularly in the country's north, where cloudburst-triggered deluges have killed nearly 400 people since Aug.15. In total, over 700 Pakistanis have died in this year's monsoon season, which began on Jun. 26, according to the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA).
