SRINAGAR: Nearly 200 people were killed in torrential rains in northwest Pakistan over the past 24 hours, with bad weather also bringing down a rescue helicopter, local officials said on Friday as reported by BBC.
Cloud bursts, flash floods, lightning strikes and building collapses amid heavy rain caused fatalities in the hills and mountains of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, they said.
The meteorological department has issued a heavy rain alert for Pakistan’s northwest for the next few hours, urging people to take “precautionary measures”.
Hundreds of rescue workers are still searching for survivors in Buner, a mountainous district in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province where torrential rains and cloudbursts triggered massive flooding on Friday, said Mohammad Suhail, a spokesman for the emergency services. Dozens of homes were swept away.
According to the provincial disaster management authority, as per Reuters, at least 351 people have died in rain-related incidents this week across Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and the northern region of Gilgit-Baltistan.
Such cloudbursts are increasingly common in India’s Himalayan regions and Pakistan’s northern areas, and experts have said climate change is a contributing factor.
