(Rio de Janeiro) Torrential rains caused flooding and multiple landslides in the Brazilian state of Rio de Janeiro, killing at least ten people, including eight children, and nine missing, authorities announced on Saturday.
Posted at 2:43 p.m.
Updated at 4:28 p.m.
Two days of heavy rainfall hit a large swath of the Atlantic coast of the southeastern Brazilian state, the latest in a string of deadly weather that experts say is getting worse with the change. climatic.
The new rains come six weeks after flash floods and landslides killed 233 people in Petrópolis, also in Rio de Janeiro state.
This time around, the hardest hit areas include the popular resort of Paraty, where a mother and six of her children aged 2 to 17 died in a landslide, authorities said. A seventh child survivor was hospitalized in stable condition.
Four other people were injured and 219 houses were damaged, seven of which were completely swept away, added the Paraty authorities, who have identified 71 families to be rehoused.
Two other children died in Angra dos Reis, where the authorities declared a state of maximum alert and where four houses were destroyed in the same neighborhood.
In Mesquita, a 38-year-old man died of electrocution while trying to help another person escape the floods, according to media reports.
These heavy rains fell on the state of Rio de Janeiro for two days. Friday evening, they turned the streets of several cities into torrents and triggered landslides, a frequent phenomenon during the rainy season, especially in poor hillside neighborhoods.
Angra thus received 655 mm of rain in 48 hours, “levels never recorded before”, according to the municipal authorities who mobilized all their teams to come to the aid of the population.
The federal government has announced the dispatch of military aircraft to assist in search and rescue efforts.
Experts warn that the rainy season in Brazil is worsened by the La Niña phenomenon – the cyclical cooling of the Pacific Ocean – and the impact of climate change.
The risk and intensity of flooding from extreme precipitation increases when the atmosphere is warmer and retains water.
In January, torrential rains caused flooding and landslides that killed at least 28 people in southeastern Brazil, mainly in the state of Sao Paulo.
Heavy rains also occurred in the northeastern state of Bahia, where 24 people died in December.