On June 6, 2021, after a torrential rain in Kelaniya, a suburb of Colombo, residents struggled forward in the flood.
Photo: Signed S. Kodikara / AFP
- After flooding in parts of Sri Lanka and southern India, nine people have died and two others are missing.
- More floods may occur in the next few days, and the downpour will be transferred to the northern coast of Sri Lanka.
- In India, the authorities have established more than 150 relief camps to distribute food and aid to people who were forced to leave their homes.
Colombo-Sri Lanka and parts of southern India were flooded by heavy rains for more than a week, killing 9 people and missing 2 others.
Nearly half of Sri Lanka’s 25 districts were hit by floods, and the worst-hit areas were the central highlands and surrounding areas of the island’s tea production.
Pradeep Kodippili of Sri Lanka’s Disaster Management Agency told AFP on Monday that since rains began at the end of October, Sri Lanka has “reported 5 deaths and 2 missing”.
The country’s Meteorological Bureau warned that more floods may occur in the next few days, and the downpour will be transferred to the country’s northern coast around Jaffna.
Local Disaster Management Minister KKSSR Ramachandran said on Sunday that four people in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu were also killed in “rain-related incidents.”
The road is underwater and the trees are uprooted
The minister added that the authorities have established more than 150 relief camps to distribute food and aid to those who were forced to leave their homes.
Most of the main roads in Chennai, the state capital, were flooded, and trees were uprooted, disrupting traffic.
People saw residents wading around the city, the depth of the water reached ankles, passing by the century-old city government office.
During record rainfall in 2015, floods in Chennai killed more than 250 people.
Scientists say that the increasingly unpredictable extreme weather in South Asia is caused by climate change and is exacerbated by deforestation, dams and overdevelopment.
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