Deaths due to the heavy rains that have hit the Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul in recent days, on the border with Uruguay and Argentina, rose to 31, while the number of missing people reached 74, local authorities reported this Friday.
The rainfall, whose volume in recent days has been almost four times greater than the average for this period, has affected more than 350,000 people in 235 municipalities this week, according to the local Civil Defense.
“The situation is absurdly exceptional. It is not a critical case, it is the most critical in the state in its history,” said the governor of Rio Grande do Sul, Eduardo Leite.
The Uruguayan official candidate Álvaro Delgado presented his program: 3% inflation and reduction of public jobs.
The regional president pointed out that the number of deaths “unfortunately is going to increase” because “there are inaccessible places,” but he stressed that thousands of people are acting by land, water and sea to help in the rescues.
Leite again asked for people’s collaboration to leave the risk areas due to the impossibility of reaching all the affected places immediately.
The storms have not let up since Monday and this Thursday they caused the rupture of a dam on the Antas River, although the surrounding inhabitants had already been evacuated, but there is a risk that the same thing could happen in five other dams.
So far, the tragedy has already forced 10,242 people to take refuge in the homes of relatives or friends, while another 4,645 are in temporary shelters.
Due to the magnitude of the tragedy, the governor decreed a state of public calamity for a period of 180 days throughout Rio Grande do Sul.
Leite met this Thursday with the Brazilian president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who traveled to the region to see first-hand the magnitude of the tragedy and reiterate the Government’s support to face the consequences of the storm.
“The federal government will be 100% with the people of Rio Grande do Sul to provide resources and so that we can repair the damage,” declared the president, who assured that “there will be no shortage of help” to cover the basic needs of the population.
The Armed Forces have deployed eight aircraft, to which another eight can be added, and more than 600 soldiers, a number that can reach up to 1,500 depending on the evolution of the storm.
Rio Grande do Sul, with a population of 11 million people, has suffered in the last year the repeated blow of the El Niño climate phenomenon, with an extratropical cyclone that caused more than 40 deaths in September.
“It’s going to get worse”
“I’ve never seen anything like this (…) it’s all under water, it’s sad. And it’s going to get worse (…) Who can sleep at night? We don’t know how the water is going to rise, and when it reaches the door of the house we can’t lift anything,” Raul Metzel, a 52-year-old machine operator in Capela de Santana, told the AFP news agency. impacted by the floods.
“We can’t do anything for anyone. Part of my family and other people I know are in Montenegro (affected by the Caí River) and I can’t bring anyone here because we have no way to go,” said Claudio Oliveira, a 54-year-old mechanic, with regret.
The rains hit 235 municipalities and have also left 56 injured and more than 350,000 affected.
Leite highlighted efforts to “save lives,” given the threat of more river and stream overflows in the state in the coming hours. And he alerted the inhabitants of six mountain municipalities of overflows of the Caí River, after asking on Wednesday night to evacuate the homes in the Taquari River valley due to the hydrological risk. The authorities also reported the partial failure of a dam in the mountain municipality of Cotipora.
Although devastation is not expected in the area, the volume of water will raise the Taquari River. Aerial images released by the local government showed large areas covered by the brown waters of the Guaíba River, the state’s main waterway, which is expected to reach an exceptional level.
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